YOUR   CONGRESS 


AN  INTERPRETATION  OF  THE  POLITICAL 

AND  PARLIAMENTARY  INFLUENCES 

THAT  DOMINATE  LAW  MAKING 

IN  AMERICA 


By  i 

LYNN  HAINES 


PUBLISHED  BY 

THE  NATIONAL  VOTERS*  LEAGUE 

831-33  WOODWARD  BUILDING 

WASHINGTON,  D,  C- 


Copyright.  1915,  by  Lynn  Haines. 

J 


NATIONAL  CAPITAL  PRESS 
WASHINGTON,  D.  C. 


TKlo% 
hiss. 


TO  WHOM  IT  SHOULD  CONCERN: 

I  am  not  inscribing  this  little  book  to  my  wife  whose 
counsel  guided  me,  nor  to  my  parents  who  gave  me  the 
desire  for  such  work,  but  to  the  common  citizen  whom  I 
shall  never  see  or  know:  the  individual  to  whom  I  would 
carry  the  message  that  laws  more  than  labor  determine 
what  each  of  us  shall  have  to  enjoy;  that  government 
means  more,  not  in  sentiment,  but  in  dollars  and  cents, 
than  does  his  or  her  business,  regardless  of  how  great  that 
private  enterprise  may  be. 


346545 


CONTENTS 


The  individual's  material  interest  in  government  is  suggested 
in  the  dedication — 

Page 
To  Whom  It  Should  Concern 3 


IN  THE  FOREWORD 
The  Reasons  for  It ^ 9 

More  House  Than  Senate 10 

The  System  Rather  Than  Individuals 11 

Another  "Double  Standard" 12 

Set  forth  the  scope  and  purpose  of  the  book. 

CHAPTER  I 

POLITICIANS  AT  PLAY 13 

Includes  a  series  of  incidents  which  illustrate  the  plunder  of 
congressional  politics  and  the  general  character  of  members. 
These  stories  include : 

The  Congressional  Time  Clock 13 

A  farcical  attiempt  to  make  members  earn  their  salaries. 

Forty  Cents  a  Mile 15 

All  sides  of  the  mileage  graft;  and 

The  Mulhall-McDermott  Fiasco 28 

In  which  the  politicians  make  a  defensive  fight. 

Such  incidents,  which  are  not  isolated  examples,  but  typical  of  the 
system,  signify  something  big  and  vital — that  modern  politics  is 
not  the  means  to  good  government,  but  an  end  in  itself,  this  end 
being  office  and  the  perquisites  of  office.  This  truth  is  elaborated 
in — 

5 


^^' 


()  YOUR  CONGRESS 

CHAPTER  II 

Page 

MODERN  POLITICS— AN  INTERPRETATION 38 

Ninety-five  per  cent  of  the  attention  of  Congress  is  given  to 
political  matters.  There  is  a  chart  showing  the  comparative 
time  given  to  various  issues.  The  basic  elements  of  the  end-in- 
itself  political  system — 

Patronage 41 

The  Pork  Barrel 42 

Perversion  of  Public  Opinion,  and 44 

Bi-Partisanship 46 

are  traced  to  their  common  center,  parliamentary  conditions  in 
Congress.  The  immediate  problem  is  big  politics,  rather  than 
big  business.  Political  reform  must  be  carried  on  through  (1) 
parliamentary  reconstruction,  (2)  adequate  educational  publicity, 
and  (3)  the  anti-spoils,  anti-political,  balance  of  power  position 
in  elections  and  legislation.     There  follows  a  defining  of — 

Insurgency 52 

Before  determining  upon  remedies  for  parliamentary  conditions 
it  is  necessary  (1)  to  know  the  history  of  rules  reform,  and  (2)  to 
understand  conditions  as  they  exist  today.  The  first  part  of  this 
preliminary  ground  is  covered  in — 

CHAPTER  III 

THE  EBB  AND  FLOW  OF  INSURGENCY 53 

Where  there  is  traced,  with  a  diagram  illustrating  each  stage,  the 
history  of  rules  reform  efforts  in  the  House,  from  the  rise  of 
insurgency  in  1907  to  its  collapse  in  1911.  Both  individual  and 
party  elements  are  detailed,  with  the  sham  battles  of  the  bi- 
partisan machine  duly  emphasized. 

Getting  at  the  Truth  of  It 66 

Has  to  do  with  the  perversion  of  public  opinion  in  reference  to 
rules  reform  in  1911,  and  leads  to — 


YOUR  CONGRESS  ,  7 

CHAPTER  IV 

/Page 
LEGISLATING  WITH  A  DARK  LANTERN 67 

In  which  present  parliamentary  conditions  are  discussed  in  detail. 

Organizing  the  House — Then  and  Now 69 

Details  the  processes  of  reassembling  the  congressional  machine. 

The  Closed  Caucus 75 

A  vicious  instrumentality  that  touches  legislation  at  every  point, 
is  discussed  in  all  its  phases. 

The  Disfranchising  of  Members 80 

Through  the   caucus  principle  is  illustrated  with  a  map  and 
figures. 

The  Control  of  Committees 86 

Includes  the  amazing  story  of  the  "discharge  calendar." 

The  Rules  Committee .    .    .    , 92 

^^         With  its  almost  absolute  authority  over  all' questions  of  procedure, 
is  next  considered. 

After  showing  how   the  unlighted,   undemocratic  congressional 
.  machine  is  organized  and  controlled,  each  stage  of  legislation  is 
studied : 

\  The  Individual  Member 96 

\  ^^^^ow  and  where  he  becomes  submerged,  the  things  he  has  to  do  in 
^"^  order  to  survive  in  politics: 

Standing  Committees 100 

Their  organization,  plunder  practices,  and  obstructive  powers; 

The  Committee  of  the  Whole .    103 

The  House  under  an  assumed  name ; 

The  Open  House 105 

Showing  how  few  and  inadequate  are  the  opportunities  for  a 
direct  and  public  facing  of  issues;  and — 


8  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Page 
The  Conference  Committee 106 

The  final,  inevitable  vicious  instrumentality  of  a  bi-cameral 
Congress. 

In  a  general  summary  of  parliamentary  conditions  and  practices, 
it  is  revealed  that  there  is  no  regular  orderly  procedure — that 
the  rules  are  such  that  the  smallest  minority  may  block  legislation 
which  the  leaders  do  not  want,  while,  when  the  reigning  oligarchy 
does  desire  action,  all  rules  are  trampled  under  foot. 

The  object  of  this  book  is  constructive.  Insurgency  failed 
because  it  never  presented  adequate  constructive  remedies. 

Where  Credit  Is  Due 110 

Discloses  the  sources  of  assistance  in  preparing — 


CHAPTER  V 

RECONSTRUCTING  CONGRESS 112 

In  which  there  are  outlined  the  principles  upon  which  needed 
parliamentary  and  political  and  institutional  changes  should  be 
r*-—.^.,^^^^  founded. 

\     As  Citizen  Instead  of  Subject 125 

\  A  small  essay  on  democracy,  introduces — 

CHAPTER  VI 

THE  NATIONAL  VOTERS'  LEAGUE 127 

With  an  outline  of  the  organization  and  publicity  objects  of  this 
movement. 

The  Appendix 137 

Contains  a  table  of  votes  revealing  the  attitude  of  all  members  on 
fifteen  important  political  andparliamentary  tests. 


THE  REASONS  FOR  IT 

My  life  work  is  in  the  development  of  the  National  Voters' 
League.     I  want  this  book  to  interpret  and  aid  that  movement. 

With  no  other  interests  to  intrude,  I  have  had  unusual  oppor- 
tunities to  study  Congress  at  close  range.  It  is  my  ambition  to 
know  what  is  vital  about  the  National  Government.  I  expect  to 
write  an  annual  book  on  Congress.  I  want  that  book  to  become  an 
institution,  more  and  more  in  demand  as  a  right  educational 
influence.     I  hope  for  this  volume  that  it  may  advance  that  ambition. 

Human  happiness  should  be  the  goal  of  government.  I  desire 
happiness  for  myself.  The  most  enduring  foundation  for  indi- 
vidual peace  of  mind  is  general  contentment,  which  can  exist  only 
when  those  in  public  position  have  a  vision  of  the  functions  of 
government  and  are  wholesomely  performing  their  duties  to  society. 
It  is  only  selfish  that  I  should  want  this  book  to  help  toward  better 
government. 

Our  government  is,  at  least  it  should  be,  the  exercise  of  sover- 
eignty in  the  interest  of  society.  At  present  politics  is  the  only 
instrumentality  through  which  moral  and  economic  truths  may  be 
translated  into  the  life  of  the  people.  Instead  of  being,  as  it  should 
be,  only  the  agency,  the  means,  to  that  end,  which  is  the  common 
welfare,  modern  politics  has  become  an  end  in  itself,  this  end  being 
office  and  the  ever-increasing  perquisites  of  office/  I  want  this 
book  to  show  the  perverted  character  of  modern  politics. 

In  our  desire  for  greater  industrial  democracy,  we  have  placed 
the  cart  before  the  horse.  We  have  attempted  economic  changes 
without  first  controlling  politics,  the  only  m.eans  of  their  accomplish- 
ment. Politics  must  be  given  new  character,  new  aims  and  ends, 
before  much  moral  and  economic  advancement  can  be  secured 
through  politics.  I  would  have  this  book  emphasize  that  immediate 
problem,  which  is  not  so  much  big  business  as  it  is  big  politics. 
And  I  am  venturing  to  outline  the  fundamental  remedies  whereby 
modern  politics  may  be  converted  from  principal  to  agent  in 
government. 

9 


10  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Above  ail  else,  I  hope  that  this  book  may  do  a  little  toward 
teaching  the  importance  and  meaning  of  government.  When  each 
individual  sees  his  or  her  material  interest  in  public  affairs,  then 
politics  will  be  shorn  of  its  professionalism  and  its  plunder. 

I  have  written  of  the  past  and  present  in  Congressional  matters. 
The  immediate  future  is  the  object  of  it  all.  Political  recon- 
struction can  only  be  built  upon  an  adequate  understanding  of  the 
conditions  that  require  correction. 

MORE  HOUSE  THAN  SENATE 

These  revelations  relate  largely  to  the  House  of  Representatives. 
The  problems  of  the  Senate  are  different,  and  far  less  difficult. 
Both  democracy  and  deliberation  exist  to  some  extent  in  the  upper 
branch  of  Congress.  Its  miembership  is  not  too  large  to  be  work- 
able. It  has  no  gag  rules.  Its  members  are  not  elected  by  districts, 
and  their  longer  terms  remove  them  still  more  from  the  bargainings 
of  politics.  The  Senate  has  thirty  record  votes  to  every  one  in 
the  House. 

THE  SYSTEM  RATHER  THAN  INDIVIDUALS 

The  House  has  a  system  against  which  individuals  do  not 
count.  Only  in  the  rarest  events  do  individuals  stand  out  apart 
from  its  machine.  This  book  deals  mostly  with  the  system.  If 
it  did  seek  to  portray  personalities,  and  praiseworthy  perforni- 
ances,  I  would  first  single  out  these  men: 

Sydney  Anderson,  of  Minnesota,  as  a  protest  against  the 
whosesale  disfranchisement  of  the  minority,  braved  the  ridicule  of 
colleagues  by  resigning  from  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee.  It 
marked  his  independence  and  made  the  country  think. 

Robert  Crosser,  of  Ohio,  is  an  independent  Democrat  who 
labored  conspicuously  for  democracy  in  the  District  of  Columbia 
and  the  municipalizing  of  its  utilities. 

James  A.  Frear,  of  Wisconsin,  made  two  notable,  though  futile, 
fights;  one  against  the  Rivers  and  Harbors  pork  barrel  bill,  and  the 
other  in  the  Whaley  election  contest  case. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  11 

Edward  Keating,  of  Colorado,  refused  to  be  yoked  and  driven  by 
the  Democratic  leaders.  He  did  creditable  work  in  the  Colorado 
strike  matter  and  for  the  woman  suffrage  amendment. 

M.  Clyde  Kelly,  of  Pennsylvania,  was  the  only  consistent 
advocate  of  publicity  on  the  Rules  Committee.  In  and  out  of 
that  body,  he  fought  gag  rules  and  methods. 

William  Kent,  of  California,  is  the  only  political  independent  in 
the  House.  He  affiliates  with  no  party,  coming  to  Congress  in  all 
ways  free  and  independent.  In  that  respect  he  stands  as  the 
prophet  of  a  new  and  advanced  order. 

David  Lewis,  of  Maryland,  has  led  and  is  leading  a  masterful 
fight  for  the  postalization  of  telephone  and  telegraph. 

Charles  A.  Lindbergh,  of  Minnesota,  is  the  hardest  worker  in 
the  House.  He  was  the  first  to  rebel  against  the  caucus  and 
Cannonism,  and  there  has  been  no  sign  of  waning,  no  decrease  of 
industry,  in  the  subsequent  years  which  saw  other  insurgents 
weary  of  the  struggle. 

William  J.  MacDonald,  of  Michigan,  was  the  most  conspicuous 
new  member  in  the  last  Congress,  through  his  persistent  attempts 
to  thwart  the  bi-partisan  machine  in  its  whitewashing  of  all  and 
everything  connected  with  the  Mulhall  expose. 

Victor  Murdock,  of  Kansas,  is  one  of  the  original  insurgents 
whose  opposition  to  machine  methods  has  increased  with  the  years. 

John  M.  Nelson,  of  Wisconsin,  another  of  the  original  anti- 
Cannon  group,  has  remained  consistent  in  that  attitude.  In  the 
Mulhall-McDermott  matter  he  stood  fearlessly  against  the 
whitewash. 

Raymond  B.  Stevens,  of  New  Hampshire,  one  of  the  few  inde- 
pendent Democrats,  proved  his  ability  and  independence  in 
numerous  things.  His  best  work  was  in  the  darkened  Interstate 
Commerce  Committee  and  against  the  water  power  program  of  the 
bi-partisan  politicians. 

Clyde  Tavenner,  of  Illinois,  made  an  able  and  determined  fight 
against  the  private  manufacture  if  munitions  of  war. 

And  the  five  Republicans — Cary  and  Cooper,  of  Wisconsin, 
Mapes,  of  Michigan,  and  Norton  and  Young,  of  North  Dakota, 


12  YOUR  CONGRESS 

who  refused  to  join  the  harmony  movement  within  their  party, 
their  independence  being  evidenced  in  the  refusal  to  support 
James  R.  Mann  for  Speaker,  certainly  would  be  entitled  to  special 
recognition. 

ANOTHER  ''DOUBLE  STANDARD'' 

If  a  grocer's  helper  kept  his  family  larder  supplied  with  articles 
surreptitiously  taken  from  his  employer's  shelves,  the  practice 
would  not  be  called  legitimate. 

If  a  clothier's  clerk  were  to  garment  himself,  in  the  stillness  of 
night,  from  the  stock  of  his  employer,  that,  too,  would  be  illegal. 

If  the  teller  of  a  bank  were  to  divert  to  his  own  uses  a  portion  of 
the  money  passing  through  his  hands,  he  would  hardly  be  called  a 
good  citizen. 

Why  are  the  petty  misappropriations  of  private  life  considered 
so  different  from  those  in  public  affairs  1 


CHAPTER  I 

POLITICIANS  AT  PLAY 
The;  Congressional  Timk  Clock 

The  House  of  Representatives,  engaged  in  the  making  of 
laws  for  the  rest  of  us,  has  for  years  taken  Hghtly  one  of  its 
own  enactments.  There  is  a  statute  which  forbids  Congress- 
men their  salary  when  not  attending  sessions.  Our  national 
legislators  have  always  honored  this  law  a  thousand  times 
more  in  breach  than  observance. 

Last  year,  on  August  25,  the  leaders  suddenly  decided  that 
there  was  too  much  Congressional  truancy.  Perhaps  they 
arrived  at  this  decision  because  the  public  was  beginning  to 
take  notice  of  no-quorum  difficulties.  At  any  rate,  they  started 
the  time  clock  and  arranged  to  check  up  members  in  the  most 
effective  way — no  attendance,  no  salary.  And  they  adver- 
tised far  and  wide  this  devotion  to  public  business.  That  was 
a  significant  phase  of  the  incident.  Advertising  is  the  life  of 
politics.  Had  these  politicians  not  desired  advertising,  they 
might  have  done  no  more  than  enforce  the  old  law  on  the 
subject.  Of  course  that  could  not  have  been  done  in  such 
a  way  as  to  yield  the  coveted  advertising,  because  publicity  so 
founded  would  also  have  advertised  the  fact  of  their  having 
so  long  ignored  the  law.  Accordingly,  with  trumpets  tuned 
high,  they  passed  a  new  resolution,  which  was  as  follows : 

HOUSE  RESOLUTION  601 

Resolved,  That  all  leaves  of  absence  heretofore  granted  to  Members 
are  hereby  revoked. 

Resolved  further.  That  the  Sergeant  at  Arms  is  hereby  directed  to 
notify  all  absent  Members  of  the  House  by  wire  that  their  presence 
in  the  House  of  Representative  is  required,  and  that  they  must  return 
without  delay  to  Washington. 

Resolved  further,  That  the  Sergeant  at  Arms  is  directed  to  enforce 
the  law  requiring  him  to  deduct  from  the  salary  of  Members  their 
daily  compensation  when  they  are  absent  for  other  cause  than  sickness 
of  themselves  and  their  families. 

13 


14  YOUR  CONGRESS 

This  was  remarkable.  It  said  to  Congressmen,  "You  are 
neglecting  your  official  duties;  return  to  work  and  remain  at 
your  task;  otherwise  you  will  be  arrested  and  brought  back." 
It  charged  the  makers  of  law  with  disrespect  for  and  the 
breaking  of  law.  It  was  an  admission  that  leaves  of  absence 
had  not  been  legally  founded.  In  instructing  the  disbursing 
officer  in  this  special  exigency  to  enforce  a  law  which  had 
so  long  been  disobeyed,  it  showed  the  necessity  of  at  least  a 
double  enactment  to  validate  a  statute  so  far  as  the  authors 
of  it  were  concerned.  It  constituted  a  confession  that  a  law 
affecting  members  was  not  to  be  taken  seriously  unless  the 
House  specifically,  in  a  subsequent  action,  commanded  its 
enforcement. 

House  Resolution  No.  601  accomplished  its  purpose.  Many 
members  hurriedly  returned  and  stood  around — in  working 
clothes.  It  brought  to  Washington  Congressmen  who  had 
been  so  persistently  away  that  the  doorkeepers  hardly  recog- 
nized them.  Others  did  not  return.  Possibly  they  knew 
what  the  sequel  was  to  be. 

The  advertising  ended  at  this  point.  Subsequent  develop- 
ments lacked  the  spotlight.  Only  a  careful  searching  of  the 
records  would  disclose  that  on  March  3,  1915,  the  last  all-night 
session,  with  only  a  sleepy,  worn-out  few  present,  under  sus- 
pension of  the  rules,  without  debate,  this  resolution  was 
adopted : 

HOUSE  JOINT  RESOLUTION  437 

Resolved  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United 
States  of  America  in  Congress  assembled,  That  the  Speaker  be,  and 
he  is  hereby,  directed  to  certify  for  payment  of  the  respective  amounts 
heretofore  deducted  from  the  annual  salaries  of  Members  of  the  House 
in  obedience  to  H.  Res.  601,  agreed  to  August  twenty-fifth,  nineteen 
hundred  and  fourteen.  And  the  Sergeant  at  Arms  is  directed  to  pay 
said  Members  the  amounts  so  respectively  certified. 

That  was  the  sequel  of  the  sham  attempt  to  make  members 
earn  their  salaries.  The  politicians,  with  blare  of  trumpets, 
had  docked  themselves,  and  then,  with  the  lights  of  publicity 
turned  off,  quietly  returned  the  money  to  their  own  pockets. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  15 

This  refunding  resolution  was  even  more  remarkable  than 
its  predecessor.  The  first  resolution  put  temporary  life  into 
an  unrepealed,  but  dormant  and  neglected  statute.  The  second 
one,  without  repealing  either,  set  aside  not  only  the  previous 
advertising  resolution  which  had  supplemented  the  law,  but 
also  the  solemn  statute  itself. 

More  astounding  than  all  other  features,  the  public  is 
denied  every  financial  detail.  I  made  repeated  attempts  to 
get  a  list  of  the  members  involved,  with  the  amounts  refunded 
to  each,  all  of  which  were  futile.  As  a  last  resort,  I  sought 
the  aid  of  Congressmen  who  tried  in  vain  to  obtain  the  infor- 
mation for  me. 

Forty  Cknts  a  MiIvE 

The  story  of  what  one  session  of  the  last  Congress  did  to 
save  its  mileage  plunder  is  equally  illuminating. 

Here,  again,  Congress  does  not  encourage  inquiry.  No 
details  of  its  mileage  profits  are  published,  and  a  most  insist- 
ent investigation  failed  to  discover  them.  First,  I  sent  an 
assistant  to  four  different  public  officials,  each  of  whom  had 
the  information,  but  all  refused  to  disclose  it.  Then  I  wrote 
to  the  chairman  of  the  House  Committee  on  Mileage,  whose 
only  committee  function  is  to  prepare  mileage  data.  He 
replied  that  he  did  not  have  the  figures,  and  directed  me  to 
the  Sergeant-at-Arms  of  the  House.  That  office  most  emphati- 
cally refused  to  give  out  the  dollars  and  cents  details.  Then 
Congressmen  tried  without  success  to  obtain  the  figures  for  me. 

We  only  know  that  it  costs  the  country  40  cents  a  mile,  f 
Congressional  distance — 20  cents  each  way — to  get  its  legis- 
lators to  and  from  regular  sessions  of  Congress.  There  is  a 
suspicion  that  in  many  cases  the  distance  "actually  traveled" 
is  less  than  the  number  of  miles  for  which  the  public  pays,  a  » 
suspicion  which  naturally  increases  with  the  secrecy  surround- 
ing the  subject. 

In  the  earlier  days  of  the  republic,  this  mileage  allowance 
was  recognized  as  a  legitimate  part  of  a  Congressman's  in- 


16  YOUR  CONGRESS 

come.     On  July  28,   1866,   an   act   was   approved,   of   whicli 
Section  17  was  as  follows : 

That  the  compensation  of  each  vSenator,  Representative,  and  Dele- 
gate in  Congress  shall  be  $5,000  per  annum  to  be  computed  from  the 
first  day  of  the  present  session,  and  in  addition  thereto  mileage  at 
the  rate  of  20  cents  per  mile,  to  be  estimated  by  the  nearest  route 
usually  traveled  in  going  to  and  returning  from  each  regular  session. 

In  1907,  on  February  26,  a  law  was  passed  which  raised  the 
salary  of  members  from  $5,000  to  $7,500.    Section  4  reads : 

That  on  and  after  March  4,  1907,  the  compensation  of  the  Speaker 
of  the  House  of  Representatives,  the  Vice-President  of  the  United 
States,  and  the  heads  of  executive  departments  who  are  Members  of 
the  President's  Cabinet,  shall  be  at  the  rate  of  $12,000  per  annum  each, 
and  the  compensation  of  Senators,  Representatives  in  Congress,  Dele- 
gates from  the  Territories  and  the  Resident  Commissioner  from  Porto 
Rico,  shall  be  at  the  rate  of  $7,500  per  annum  each. 

At  this  point,  mileage  took  on  its  present  questionable  char- 
acter. Its  legitimacy  became  a  matter  of  doubt.  I  do  not 
mean  to  infer  that  Congress  entertained  any  doubt,  at  least 
none  was  ever  manifested.  The  law  of  1907  repealed  the  law 
of  1866.  Congress  agrees  to  this  in  so  far  as  increased  sal- 
aries are  concerned,  hut  has  assumed  that  the  repeal  did  not 
extend  to  the  mileage  allowance.  Moreover,  there  has  been 
no  specific  subsequent  enactment  authorizing  mileage,  except- 
ing in  annual  appropriation  bills.  Not  being  a  proper  subject 
of  advertising,  the  politicians  have  gone  on  assuming  that  the 
repeal  force  of  the  law  of  1907  stopped  short  two  commas 
from  the  end  of  a  paragraph.  Throughout  this  recital,  as  in 
every  consideration  of  the  subject,  we  find  members  referring 
to  20  cents  a  mile  each  way  as  ''existing  law." 

In  recounting  what  happened  in  respect  to  mileage  in  the 
Sixty-third  Congress,  it  should  be  remembered  that  every 
Congress  goes  through  much,  the  same  farcical  procedure. 
Mileage  is  always  a  part  of  the  Legislative,  Executive  and 
Judicial  appropriation  bill,  which  is  considered  once  a  year, 
at  every- regular  session. 

No  longer  able  to  disguise  it,  the  play  seems  to  have  taken 
the  character  of  a  demonstration  to  the  people  that  the  poli- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  17 

ticians  of  the  House  are  opposed  to  the  plunder;  that  it  is 
''forced"  upon  them.  In  the  first  scene,  on  April  3,  1914,  the 
Appropriations  Committee  reported  this  substitute  for  the  old, 
unpopular  provision : 

For  actual  traveling  expenses  incurred  by  Senators,  including  actual 
traveling  expenses  of  immediate  and  dependent  members  of  their 
families,  incurred  in  going  to  and  returning  once  from  each  session  of 
Congress  by  the  nearest  route  usually  traveled,  the  same  to  be  paid  on 
certificates  duly  approved  as  in  the  manner  heretofore  prescribed  for 
the  payment  of  mileage,  $25,000. 

There  was  a  similar  paragraph  for  House  members. 

Whether  or  not  it  was  so  intended,  the  phrasing  of  this 
substitute  was  full  of  cleverly  masked  plunder.  Under  its 
provisions,  members  might  have  traveled  royally  at  public 
expense.  And  the  words,  "immediate  and  dependent  members 
of  their  families,"  could  have  been  construed  to  include  serv- 
ants, and  friends  masquerading  as  servants.  The  words  "each 
session"  also  were  significant.  The  suggested  change  was  so 
phrased  as  to  include  special  assemblings  of  Congress.  In  all 
probability  this  substitute  would  have  resulted  only  in  a  varia- 
tion of  the  same  plunder.  But  it  served  the  purposes  of  the 
play. 

It  should  be  stated  at  this  point  that  bills,  after  leaving  com- 
mittees, are  first  considered  in  Committee  of  the  Whole,  which 
is  the  House  under  an  assumed  name.  The  alias  enables 
Congressmen  to  violate  the  Constitution  in  reference  to  roll 
calls.  They  call  themselves  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  and 
then  have  the  rules  provide  that  there  shall  be  no  record 
votes  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole. 

The  House,  in  the  darkness  of  the  Committee  of  the  Whole, 
made  short  work  of  this  substitute.  Twenty-cent  mileage 
each  way  was  quickly  placed  in  the  bill.  Representative 
Good,  of  Iowa,  made  the  first  move.  He  proposed  the  follow- 
ing amendment: 

Page  2,  lines  4  to  10  inclusive,  strike  out  the  paragraph  and  insert : 
"For  mileage  of  Senators  $51,000." 


18  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Mr.  Good  stood  for  the  old  mileage  rate,  and  worked  and 
voted  that  attitude  out  in  the  open.  But  obviously  the  play 
was  to  have  the  Senate  bear  the  brunt  of  the  odium  for  con- 
tinuing the  plunder.  Senators  are  farther  from  the  people; 
they  do  not  face  re-election  so  often.  The  House,  then,  under 
its  assumed  name,  without  a  record  vote,  magnanimously  de- 
cided to  give  Senators  20  cents  a  mile.  It  would  follow,  of 
course,  that  the  Senate  would  either  refuse  to  receive  that 
amount  or  else  insist  that  House  members  get  the  same.  The 
House  knew  that  the  Senate  would  not  refuse. 

It  would  not  have  served  the  purposes  of  politics  to  reach 
the  appointed  climax  at  once,  and  the  play  progressed.  Sev- 
eral other  amendments  were  proposed.^ 

Mr.  Foster's  proposal  to  eliminate  the  ^'dependent  members 
of  families"  part,  the  chief  joker  in  the  committee  substitute, 
was  voted  upon  and  rejected.  Mr.  Bartlett's  10-cents-a-mile 
amendment  shared  the  same  fate.  The  amendment  of  Mr. 
Good,  providing  20-cent  mileage  for  Senators,  was  adopted, 
73  to  41. 

Then  for  a  time  the  parliamentary  hair-splitters  held  sway. 
Points  of  procedure  were  raised,  questions  as  profound  and 
ponderous  as  though  the  fate  of  the  universe,  rather  than  a 
little  petty  plunder,  were  the  issue.  Finally,  Mr.  Bartlett's 
amendment  was  voted  down  again,  its  second  demise.  Follow- 
ing that,  Mr.  Page's  5-cents-a-mile  suggestion  received  the  dis- 
approval of  the  House,  32  ayes  to  63  loud  noes. 

Next,  Mr.  Thompson  insisted  that  his  wild  proposal  to 
abolish  all  mileage  be  considered.     Mr.  Good  sought  to  reflect 

1  Among  these  amendments  were  the  following: 

By  Mr.  Bartlett,  of  Georgia:  Strike  out  "$51,000"  and  insert  "$25,000." 

By  Mr.  Page,  of  North  Carolina:  Page  2,  line  10,  strike  out  the  sum  "$25,000"  and 
insert  in  lieu  thereof  the  following:  "$12,750:  Provided,  That  hereafter  each  Senator, 
Representative,  Delegate,  and  Resident  Commissioner  shall  receive  mileage  at  the  rate  of 
5  cents  a  mile,  to  be  estimated  by  the  nearest  route  usually  traveled  in  going  to  and  return- 
ing from  each  regular  session,  in  lieu  of  the  present  rate  of  20  cents  a  mile." 

By  Mr.  Thompson,  of  Oklahoma:  Page  2,  strike  out  all  of  lines  4  to  10,  inclusive,  and 
insert  in  lieu  thereof  the  following:  "That  all  laws  and  parts  of  laws  now  in  force  allowing 
mileage  to  Senators,  Representatives,  Delegates,  and  Resident  Commissioners,  be  and  the 
same  are  hereby,  repealed." 

By  Mr.  Foster,  of  Illinois:  Page  2,  lines  5  and  6,  strike  out  the  following  language: 
"Including  actual  traveling  expenses  of  immediate  and  dependent  members  of  their 
families." 


YOUR  CONGRESS  19 

on  the  standing  of  this  amendment  by  making  a  point  of 
order  against  it.  In  this  crisis,  Mr.  Madden,  of  Illinois, 
proposed : 

That  upon  the  filing  of  a  written  statement  of  any  Senator,  Repre- 
sentative, Delegate,  and  Resident  Commissioner  to  the  effect  that  he 
does  not  desire  to  accept  the  amount  credited  to  him  for  mileage  it 
shall  hereafter  be  the  duty  of  the  disbursing  officer  to  cover  the  amount 
standing  to  the  credit  of  any  such  Senator,  Representative,  Delegate 
and  Resident  Commissioner,  back  into  the  Treasury  of  the  United 
States. 

Whereupon  the  House  burst  into  laughter  and  applause. 
When  quiet  had  been  restored  and  sober  statesmanship 
reigned  once  more,  the  Congressional  Record  pictures  the 
immediate  subsequent  proceedings  as  follows : 

"The  Chairman:  The  question  is  on  the  substitute  offered  by  the 
gentleman  from  Illinois  (Mr.  Madden)  to  the  amendment  offered  by 
the  gentleman  from  Oklahoma. 

"The  question  was  taken,  and  the  Chairman  announced  that  the  noes 
appeared  to  have  it. 

"Mr.  Madden  :  Division,  Mr.  Chairman. 

"The  Committee  divided ;  and  there  were :  ayes  68,  noes  27. 

"So  the  substitute  was  agreed  to. 

"The  Chairman  :  The  question  is  on  the  amendment  as  a  substitute. 

"The  question  was  taken,  and  the  Chairman  announced  that  the 
noes  seemed  to  have  it. 

"Mr.  Thompson,  of  Oklahoma:  Division,  Mr.  Chairman. 

"The  Committee  again  divided;  and  there  were:  ayes  26,  noes  66. 

"Mr.  Thompson,  of  Oklahoma:  Mr.  Chairman,  I  demand  tellers.   . 

"Tellers  were  refused. 

"So  the  amendment  as  a  substitute  was  rejected. 

"Mr.  Murdock  :  Mr.  Chairman,  a  parliamentary  inquiry. 

"The  Chairman:  The  gentleman  will  state  it. 

"Mr.  Murdock  :  Has  the  Madden  amendment  been  adopted  ? 

"The  Chairman  :  It  has  not." 

And  neither  had  Mr.  Thompson's.  Mr.  Madden's  proposal 
had  been  substituted  for  Mr.  Thompson's  and  then  rejected, 
thus  disposing  of  both  w^ithout  a  direct  vote  on  the  one  which 
was  dangerous.  That  is  a  favorite  form  of  Congressional 
humor.    We  find  it  recurring  hundreds  of  times  every  session. 

Mr.  Good  now  came  forward  with  another  20-cents-a-mile 
amendment,  this  time  in  reference  to  House  members.  After 
the  author  had  explained,  "Mr.  Chairman,  I  want  to  say  one 
word,  that  the  amendment  I  offer  is  to  restore  existing  law," 


20  YOUR  CONGRESS 

the  Good  amendment  was  adopted,  37  to  35,  rather  a  small 
minority  of  435  members. 

In  the  meantime,  Mr.  Madden  had  recast  his  "covering 
back  into  the  treasury"  proposal  to  have  it  provide  that  in 
cases  where  members  had  not  drawn  their  mileage  money 
within  90  days  "after  the  same  has  become  available,"  it 
should  be  returned  to  the  vaults  of  Uncle  Sam.  Ninety  min- 
utes  would  have   safeguarded   members   about   as   well. 

This  time  Mr.  Madden's  amendment  was  held  to  be  out  of 
order.  Not  being  a  political  "parliamentarian,"  I  cannot 
explain  why. 

All  this  occurred  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole,  where  the 
rules  specifically  forbid  record  votes.  It  is  easy  to  see  why 
20  cents  a  mile  each  way  for  both  Senators  and  Representa- 
tives had  been  placed  in  the  bill.  But  after  a  measure  has 
gone  through  the  recordless  Committee  of  the  Whole,  the 
House,  minus  its  alias,  has  to  consider  it.  And,  if  amendments 
have  been  adopted  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole,  it  is  pos- 
sible to  secure  a  yea  and  nay  vote  upon  them  in  the  House.  If 
an  amendment  has  been  rejected  in  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole,  that  ends  it  so  far  as  a  record  vote  is  concerned.  The 
usual  machine  way  is  to  have  the  bill  presented  by  the  organi- 
zation leaders  in  the  form  in  which  they  desire  it  to  pass,  and 
then  vote  down  all  amendments  in  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole.  But  in  the  case  of  mileage,  the  Appropriations  Com- 
mittee appeared  as  opposed  to  the  old  rate,  and  hence  could 
not  report  the  bill  in  that  form.  So  20-cent  mileage  was  pro- 
vided in  Committee  of  the  Whole,  and  the  opportunity  for  a 
record  vote  came  later. 

The  House  acted  on  this  momentous  question  April  17,  1914, 
with  a  duly  recorded  vote.  The  mileage  of  both  House  and 
Senate  was  included.^ 


^Amendment  adopted  in  recordless  Committee  of  the  Whole: 

Page  2,  lines  4  to  10.  inclusive,  strike  out  the  paragraph  and  insert:  "For  mileage  of 
Senators,  S5 1,000." 

Page  12,  line  19,  strike  out  the  paragraph  beginning  on  line  19.  on  page  12,  and  mcludmg 
line  2,  on  page  13,  and  insert:  "For  mileage  of  Representatives  and  Delegates  and  expenses 
of  Resident  Commissioners,  $175,000." 


YOUR  CONGRESS  21 

A  vote  for  this  combined  amendment  meant  the  old  rate  for 
both  bodies.  A  vote  against  it,  so  Speaker  Clark  held,  meant 
a  return  to  the  bill  of  the  questionable  substitute  reported  by 
the  Appropriations  Committee  in  the  original  bill,  the  one  pro- 
viding for  actual  traveling  expenses  for  ''each  session,"  in- 
cluding "immediate  and  dependent  members  of  their  families." 
Under  its  assumed  name,  without  roll  calls,  the  House  had 
chosen  20  cents  a  mile.  Here,  acting  as  itself,  with  a  roll  call 
which  the  public  could  see  and  in  part  comprehend,  the  House 
did  not  endorse  the  position  it  had  taken  in  darkness.  The 
action  of  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  was  voted  down,  95  to 
242,  with  94  not  voting.  The  question  then  passed  automati- 
cally to  the  Senate. 

Duplicity  is  the  keynote  of  modern  politics.  Most  decep- 
tions are  successfully  concealed.  In  this  case  the  official 
records  disclose  no  hint  of  what  actually  happened  when  the 
mileage  question  was  passed  on  to  the  Senate.  It  is  reported 
that  certain  House  members  discarded  their  make-up  and  hur- 
ried over  to  the  Senate,  where  they  pleaded  with  Senators  to 
save  their  mileage ;  that  they  appeared  almost  openly  as  lobby- 
ists against  the  position  they  had  voted  in  their  own  body. 

The  Senate  received  this  momentous  matter  on  June  15,  1914. 
The  question  was  divided.  First  Senators  voted  on  the  $51,000 
item  for  their  own  allowance  at  20  cents  a  mile.  This  was 
quickly  adopted,  23  to  9,  without  a  roll  call,  although  Mr. 
Kenyon  sought  vainly  to  secure  a  record  vote. 

Then,  with  House  members  in  the  background,  with  their 
refrain  in  the  air,  "Remember  our  mileage;  save  us  from  our- 
selves," the  Senate  took  up  the  other  portion  of  the  fated 
question : 

For  mileage  of  Representatives  and  Delegates  and  expenses  of  Resi- 
dent Commissioners,  "$175,000." 

This  time  Mr.  Kenyon  was  successful  in  getting  a  record 
vote  which  resulted  42  yeas  to  17  nays,  with  thirty-six  not 
voting. 


22  YOUR  CONGRESS 

What  had  happened  to  this  point?  The  House  had  passed 
one  kind  of  mileage  provision ;  the  Senate,  in  compliance  with 
its  own  desires  and  the  whispered  wishes  of  the  House,  had 
rejected  the  House  amendments  and  re-adopted  the  old  rate. 
The  two  branches  of  Congress  were  in  disagreement,  what 
looked  to  be  a  contrived,  prearranged  disagreement.  That 
meant  a  conference  committee  to  reconcile  the  differences 
between  House  and  Senate. 

When  the  House  and  Senate  failed  to  agree,  a  conference 
committee  consisting  of  Messrs.  Thomas  S.  Martin,  Lee  S. 
Overman  and  F.  E.  Warren  for  the  Senate,  and  Messrs. 
Joseph  T.  Johnson,  Joseph  W.  Byrns  and  James  W.  Good 
for  the  House,  were  appointed  by  the  Vice-President  and 
the  Speaker.  All  three  of  these  Senators  and  Mr.  Good  on  the 
House  side  had  voted  for  the  old  rate;  Mr.  Byrns  had  voted 
against  it,  while  Mr.  Johnson  had  not  voted  either  way.  The 
minds  of  these  conferees  soon  met  on  all  features  of  the  Legis- 
lative, Executive  and  Judicial  appropriation  bill  excepting 
the  mileage  question.  Early  in  the  controversy  the  conference 
report  on  the  bill  was  adopted  in  all  respects  save  that  of  mile- 
age. That  disposed  of  all  other  phases  of  the  measure. 
Mileage  alone  was  in  disagreement.  Bear  this  in  mind.  It  has 
a  subtle  bearing  on  subsequent  acting. 

On  June  25,  1914,  Mr.  Johnson,  of  South  Carolina,  repre- 
senting the  House  conferees,  addressed  the  Speaker  and  said, 
"I  ask  now  that  the  clerk  report  Senate  amendment  No.  1 
which  is  still  in  disagreement." 

The  play  might  have  ended  here,  but  the  House  was  not 
yet  ready  to  have  mileage  "forced"  upon  it.  The  politics  of 
the  situation  seemed  to  demand  more  reluctance,  and  the  House 
made  a  flank  movement  in  favor  of  5-cent  mileage.  Mr.  Cox, 
of  Indiana,  moved  "to  recede  and  concur  in  Senate  amend- 
ment No.  1,  page  2,  with  the  following  amendment :" 

"For  mileage  of  Senators,  $25,000,  and  hereafter  Senators  shall  be 
paid  mileage  at  the  rate  of  10  cents  per  mile  each  way  while  traveling 
from  their  homes  to  Washington  City  and  return  by  the  ordinary  and 
usual  routes  of  travel,  once  at  each  session  of  Congress." 


YOUR  CONGRESS  23 

Mr.  Mann  "reserved"  a  point  of  order,  and  there  was  some 
running  debate,  mostly  political.     Then — 

Mr.  Byrnks,  of  South  Carolina,  moves  to  amend  by  striking  out  the 
figures  "$25,000,"  and  inserting  the  figures  "$12,500,"  and  by  striking 
out  the  words  "10  cents"  and  inserting  the  words  "5  cents." 

There  was  much  less  likelihood  that  the  Senate  would 
accept  5-cent  mileage  than  the  10-cent  kind.  That  may  have 
been  why  Mr.  Byrnes'  amendment  to  Mr.  Cox's  amendment 
was  adopted  on  a  roll  call,  132  to  94,  with  207  not  voting. 
Next  the  amended  amendment  was  adopted,  with  another  roll 
call,  which  fixed  the  Senate's  rate  at  5  cents  a  mile. 

On  the  following  day,  June  26,  Senate  amendment  No.  30 
came  up,  which  it  will  be  remembered  restored  the  old  20-cent 
rate  for  House  members.  Mr.  Johnson,  of  South  Carolina, 
moved  the  adoption  of  a  5-cents-a-mile  substitute. 

Mr.  Mann,  of  Illinois,  made  a  preferential  motion,  that  the 
House  recede  and  concur,  which  meant  abandon  its  own  posi- 
tion and  adopt  that  of  the  Senate — 20-cent  mileage.  There 
was  another  roll  call  on  this  indirect  facing  of  the  question, 
and  by  a  vote  of  60  to  184,  with  189  not  voting,  the  House 
refused  to  recede,  which  the  Speaker  held  to  mean  insistence 
on  its  first  position  of  actual  traveling  expenses  for  "each  ses- 
sion," including  'Mependent"  members  of  Congressional  fami- 
lies. Mr.  Mann  is  recorded  as  voting  against  his  own  motion. 
I  do  not  know  why. 

At  this  point^  the  House  had  voted  o-cent  mileage  for  Sena- 


^  After  this  vote  had  been  taken,  dividing  consideration  of  Hotise  and  Senate  mileage, 
whereas  they  had  before  been  considered  together,  Mr.  Falconer  of  Washington  secured  the 
floor  and  in  a  spirited  speech  reviewed  the  farce.     These  are  excerpts: 

"By  a  series  of  parliamentary  gymnastics  the  House  just  now  voted  not  to  recede  from 
the  House  disagreement  to  the  Senate  amendment  on  House  mileage,  and  now,  Mr.  Speaker, 
we  have  a  record  vote  of  the  same  men,  economists,  if  you  please,  last  evening  voting 
5  cents  per  mile  for  Senators'  mileage  allowance  and  today  voting  actual  traveling  expenses 
for  Representatives  and  their  families. 

"Mr.  speaker,  was  there  ever  a  more  complete  demonstration  of  political  trimming  by 
parliamentary  chicanery?     What  is  the  purpose  and  what  is  the  effect  on  the  public? 

"Mr.  Speaker,  'mileage'  and  'graft'  have  for  some  time  been  held  up  by  the  press  of  the 
country  as  synonymous  terms.  Is  there  a  man  here  who  believes  the  present  mileage  is 
graft?  If  so,  why  did  he  not  object  to  the  unanimous  consent  to  consider  Senate  and  House 
mileage  in  one  vote  by  Mr.  Byrns  of  Tennessee  when  this  bill  was  before  the  House? 

"  Mr.  Speaker,  there  has  been  no  proposition  on  which  I  have  voted,  or  had  a  chance  to 
vote,  where  20-cent  mileage  or  a  less  amount  for  House  members  has  been  involved.  Why 
do  not  the  conferees  eliminate  this  parliamentary  tangle  with  the  Senate  and  put  the 
House  on  record  on  House  mileage? 


24  YOUR  CONGRESS 

ators  and  actual  expenses  for  themselves.  As  the  House  and 
Senate  were  farther  apart  than  before,  the  play  continued, 
with  the  conference  committee  in  the  center  of  the  now  dark- 
ened stage. 

On  July  1,  with  all  other  parts  of  this  great  appropriation 
bill  settled,  remember  that,  the  House  conferees  again  reported, 
with  Mr.  Johnson  as  their  spokesman.    He  said: 

"We  have  been  able  to  agree  upon  every  item  in  the  bill  except 
amendments  1  and  30.  These  amendments,  as  the  membership  well 
knows,  deal  with  the  mileage  of  Senators  and  Representatives  and  Dele- 
gates in  Congress.  In  the  last  conference,  which  was  the  third,  the 
Senate  absolutely  refused  to  recede  from  its  position  upon  these  two 
amendments." 

The  end  was  in  sight.  The  House  was  getting  ready  to 
"yield."     Mr.  Johnson  continued: 

"I  am  not  an  authority  on  parliamentary  law,  but  I  understand  that 
it  is  a  long-established  precedent  in  all  legislative  bodies  that  where 
one  house  proposes  legislation  in  an  appropriation  bill  and  the  other 
house  finally  and  flatly  refuses  to  accept  that  legislation  the  House  pro- 
posing it  must  yield._  In  other  words,  one  legislative  body  has  no  au- 
thority to   force  legislation  upon  the  other  body." 

A  little  farther  on  this  small  cloud,  soon  to  loom  large,  was 
suggested  by  Mr.  Johnson : 

"The  conferees  on  the  part  of  the  Senate  have  assured  the  conferees 
on  the  part  of  the  House  that  they  would  rather  kill  the  bill  than  let 
this  provision  go  in  it." 

The  controversy  over  mileage  had  begun  to  threaten  the 
passage  of  the  great  appropriation  bill  of  which  it  was  a  part. 
But  Mr.  Johnson  moved  that  the  House  further  insist  upon 
its  amendment  to  Senate  amendment  No.  1 — 5-cent  mileage 
for  Senators — and  insist  on  its  disagreement  to  Senate  amend- 
ment No.  30 — actual  expenses  for  House  members.^ 


"  Mr.  Speaker,  the  result  of  this  whole  matter,  taking  as  it  has  many  hours  of  debate,  has 
been  that  some  Members  of  this  House  have  been  advertised  the  country  over  as  guardians 
of  the  public  funds,  while  actually  sparring  behind  parliamentary  methods  for  20-cent 
mileage." 

•  In  the  debate  which  followed,  more  straws  rode  the  breezes.  From  the  remarks  of 
Mr.  Cox  of  Indiana,  we  glean: 

"  Now,  here  comes  a  threat,  an  absolute  threat,  from  the  grave  and  sedate  Senators  of 
the  United  States  to  the  House  of  Representatives,  to  this  effect:  'We  propose  to  let  this 
big  appropriation  bill  fail  rather  than  give  up  our  mileage. "...  The  burden  is  not  upon 
this  House  if  this  bill  fails.  The  burden  is  upon  the  Senate  of  the  United  States,  and  if 
there  is  any  odium  attached  to  the  failure  of  this  bill,  let  them  and  them  alone  be  responsible. 
Let  no  Member  of  this  House  undertake  to  take  the  responsibility  from  their  shoulders." 


YOUR  CONGRESS  25 

There  was  another  roll  call  and  by  a  vote  of  135  to  138,  with 
170  not  voting,  the  motion  to  recede  on  Senate  amendment 
No.  1  was  defeated.    A  further  conference  was  demanded. 

In  the  Senate,  on  July  13,  1914,  Mr.  Martin,  of  Virginia, 
reported  for  the  conferees,  emphasizing  the  same  parlia- 
mentary points  that  had  been  raised  in  the  House.^ 

After  long  and  dignified  Senatorial  debate,  Mr.  Hughes, 
of  New  Jersey,  proposed  this  amendment: 

Omit  the  matter  inserted  by  the  House  amending  said  amendment, 
omit  the  matter  stricken  out  and  inserted  by  said  Senate  amendment, 
and  in  lieu  thereof  insert  the  following: 

"For  mileage  of  Senators,  $51,000:  Provided,  That  after  the  fiscal 
year  1915,  no  mileage  or  other  allowance  for  expenses  in  attendance 
on  sessions  of  Congress  shall  be  paid  to  any  Senator,  Representative, 
Delegate  from  a  Territory,  or  Resident  Commissioner." 

Vice-President  Marshall  ruled  the  Hughes  amendment  out 
of  order.  I  do  not  know  why.  Mr.  Martin  then  moved  that 
the  Senate  further  insist  on  its  amendments,  which  was  done, 
by  a  vote  of  55  to  7,  with  thirty-four  not  voting.*  And  the 
play  went  on. 

Returning  to  the  House,  on  July  14,  J.  J.  Fitzgerald,  of 
New  York,  took  charge.  Mr.  Fitzgerald  was  a  much  bigger, 
more  influential  "leader"  than  Mr.  Johnson.     This  change  of 


Mr.  Mann,  minority  leader  and  bell  weather  for  the  regular  republicans,  said: 

"  Mr.  Speaker,  in  all  parliamentary  bodies  which  consist  of  two  parts  of  equal  authority, 
there  come  times  when  one  body  must  yield  to  the  other.  Where  there  are  differences  of 
opinion  we  endeavor  to  reconcile  those  differences  through  the  appointment  of  conference 
committees,  giving  and  taking.  But  the  time  often  comes  when  one  body  proposes  some- 
thing new  and  the  other  body  declines  to  accept  it_.  Being  of  equal  authority,  it  is  a  natural 
rule  of  procedure  that  that  legislative  body  constituting  half  of  the  whole  which  proposes  a 
new  matter  must  in  the  end  yield  unless  the  other  body  consents,  because  the  bodies  are 
coequal.  When  the  Senate  proposes  an  amendment  to  a  House  appropriation  bill  which 
inserts  a  new  principle,  unless  in  the  end  the  House  is  willing  to  accept  it  the  Senate  must 
recede.  And  likewise,  when  the  House  proposes  a  new  proposition  and  the  Senate  refuses 
to  accept  it  the  House  must  recede,  because  unless  this  procedure  should  be  followed  one  of 
the  two  bodies  becomes  superior  to  the  other. 

"  Now,  we  have  reached  the  point  where  we  will  have  to  put  aside,  it  seems  to  me,  a  matter 
of  pride  and  use  common  sense.  If  we  are  going  to  yield,  let  us  yield  now.  If  we  are  going 
to  say  that  we  will  not  pass  the  legislative  bill  unless  we  can  have  our  way  about  a  new 
proposition,  we  stamp  ourselves  as  incapable  legislators." 

»  Mr.  Martin  said: 

"The  conferees  on  the  part  of  the  two  Houses  have  been  unable  to  agree  on  the  question 
of  mileage  for  Senators  and  Members  of  the  other  House. 

"So  far  as  the  Senate  conferees  are  concerned,  they  feel  practically,  indeed  distinctly, 
instructed  by  the  Senate  to  adhere  to  the  existing  law.  It  is  a  recognized  principle  in  mat- 
ters of  this  sort  in  all  legislative  bodies  when  there  is  an  existing  law  and  one  House  proposes 
to  change  it,  that  the  house  proposing  the  change  must  yield,  unless  the  house  to  which 
the  proposition  is  made  is  satisfied  with  the  change.  The  Senate  has  expressed  its  dis- 
approval of  the  provision  of  the  House  of  Representatives  in  this  bill,  which  is  a  change  of 
existing  law." 


26  YOUR  CONGRESS 

command  was  a  sign  that  the  end  was  near.     He  made  this 
motion : 

"Mr.  Fitzgerald  moves  that  the  House  recede  from  its  amendment 
to  the  amendment  of  the  Senate  No.  1,  and  recede  from  its  disagree- 
ment to  the  amendments  of  the  Senate  Nos.  1  and  30  and  agree  to 
the  same." 

Mr.  Fitzgerald,  as  chairman  of  the  great  Appropriations 
Committee,  in  arguing  for  his  motion,  emphasized  the  fate  of 
the  bill  itself. ^^     Other  House  leaders  followed  suit.^^ 

With  the  bi-partisan  leadership  practically  unanimous  for 
surrender,  the  House  ''yielded."  By  a  vote  of  132  to  121, 
with  180  not  voting,  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  motion  was  adopted. 
Twenty  cents  a  mile,  both  ways,  for  both  House  and  Senate, 
had  been  saved.  Political  records  had  been  made,  honor  pre- 
served and  everybody  was  satisfied.    So  the  play  ended. 

Such  plunder  plays  will  always  occupy  the  time  and  atten- 
tion of  the  politicians  who  make  our  laws  so  long  as  there 
is  a  bi-cameral  Congress.  With  two  branches,  one  or  the 
other,  and  often  both,  can  play  politics  to  their  hearts'  content. 
Disagreements  between  House  and  Senate  occur  on  practi- 
cally every  public  measure.  The  conference  committee,  with 
its    darkened    procedure   and   privileged    reports,    then    takes 


10  From  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  remarks: 

This  bill  carries  $36,000,000  for  the  support  of  the  departmental  services  of  the  Govern- 
ment. The  difference  involved  between  mileage  at  the  rate  of  20  cents  a  mile  and  the 
amount  estimated  and  fixed  in  the  bill  to  pay  the  actual  expenses  of  Members  and  their 
families  amounts  to  $100,000.  So  far  as  I  am  concerned,  in  view  of  the  action  of  the 
Senate,  I  believe  that  the  House,  having  demonstrated  its  desire  to  make  the  reduction  in 
the  amount  of  mileage  and  having  resorted  to  everything  within  reason  that  could  be 
justified  under  parliamentary  law  to  effect  its  purpose,  that  the  time  has  now  come  for  the 
House  to  recede  from  its  position  and  agree  to  the  Senate  provision  and  permit  the  bill  to 
become  law.  We  gain  nothing  by  further  agitation  and  discussion.  The  responsibility  for 
the  failure  to  reduce  the  mileage  from  the  amount  fixed  by  law  must  be  borne  by  the  body 
which  declines  to  yield  in  any  respect,  and  we  should  not,  in  our  desire  to  change  this 
mileage,  whatever  be  our  motive,  longer  delay  the  enactment  of  this  bill,  so  important  to 
the  maintenance  and  conduct  of  the  Government." 

"  Mr.  Gillette  of  Massachusetts,  the  ranking  republican  member  of  the  Appropriations 
Committee,  said: 

"  Mr.  Speaker,  I  agree  entirely  with  the  argument  made  by  the  gentleman  from  New  York 
(Mr.  Fitzgerald)  and  the  gentleman  from  Alabama  (Mr.  Underwood),  but  I  criticize  them 
because  they  did  not  make  that  argument  two  weeks  ago  instead  of  today." 

Mr.  Underwood,  democratic  leader,  delivered  this  ultimatum  to  the  followers  of  himself 
and  Jefferson:  ,     ^x  ,     • 

"  It  is  the  duty  of  every  man  on  this  side  of  the  House,  who  is  responsible  to  the  country  to 
maintain  this  Government,  to  pass  this  bill  at  this  time  regardless  of  his  views  on  the 
question  of  whether  there  should  be  mileage  or  whether  mileage  should  be  abolished." 
(Applause.) 

Mr.  Mann,  republican  leader,  had  already  expressed  his  attitude.     He  did  again. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  27 

charge.  The  conference  committee  has  in  it  greater  possibiH- 
ties  for  evil  results  than  any  other  parliamentary  institution. 

The  fate  of  a  big  appropriation  bill  was  involved  in  this 
mileage  plunder.  In  fact,  mileage  was  made  the  overshadow- 
ing element  in  a  $36,000,000  measure.  The  system  is  such 
that  all  sorts  of  questionable  matters  are  included  in  appro- 
priation measures.  In  addition  to  the  fact  that  the  present 
methods  of  making  appropriations  is  basicly  wrong,  there  is 
invariably  this  added  evil  of  loading  appropriation  bills  with 
alien  things.  It  would  seem  a  simple  matter  to  legislate  once 
and  for  all  on  this  mileage  question.  Certainly  it  ought  not 
to  be  given  a  position  in  which  it  would  overshadow  all  else 
in  a  great  appropriation  bill. 

This  mileage  farce  recurs  every  regular  session.  From 
twelve  to  fifteen  big  appropriation  bills  are  considered  every 
year — twice  in  each  Congress — by  both  House  and  Senate. 
The  politicians  delight  in  these  measures.  They  take  up  from 
one-third  to  two-thirds  of  the  time  of  each  regular  session. 
The  politicians  like  to  kill  time.  They  are  privileged  bills  and 
can  be  used  as  buffers  to  prevent  the  consideration  of  politi- 
cally dangerous  questions.  The  politicians  like  that  feature. 
But,  more  important  than  all  else,  the  pork  barrel  ramifies 
in  a  thousand  directions  from  these  annual  appropriation 
measures.  The  politicians  live  on  pork.  Obviously,  there 
should  be  a  responsible  budget  method  of  appropriating  public 
money,  one  that  would  divorce  the  pork  barrel  and  legislation. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  outline  the  mileage  farce  as  it 
was  repeated  in  the  last  session  of  the  Sixty-third  Congress. 
There  were  the  same  disagreements,  the  same  conference  com- 
mittee, the  same  ''reluctant  yielding"  by  the  House,  the  same 
final  result — 20  cents  a  mile  both  ways  for  both  House  and 
Senate.  This  time,  however,  the  play  lagged,  was  less  spir- 
ited, and  somewhat  shorter.  Nearby  elections  always  speed 
up  the  acting. 

These  little  stories  are  not  the  only  plunder  tales  that  might 
be  told.     But  they  are  sufficient  to  evidence  a  most  important 


28  YOUR  CONGRESS 

truth,  that  self-interest,  which  means  politics,  is  the  first  and 
last  and  intermediate  consideration  of  those  who  make  our 
laws.  From  the  viewpoint  of  professional  politicians,  "public 
service"  has  come  to  mean  "serve  us."  These  stories  reveal 
Congress  in  this  attitude  of  self-interest.  I  want  now  to  pre- 
sent the  House  in  a  related,  but  very  different  role — a  desper- 
ate defensive  struggle  to  save  its  system.  In  this  there  will 
be  seen  the  same  clever  posing  and  playing,  and  the  same 
sequel — victory  for  the  politicians.  Whether  fighting  to  gain 
plunder  or  to  save  plunder,  it  is  always  the  parliamentary  sys- 
tem that  enables  the  politicians  to  prevail.    Keep  that  in  mind. 

Thk  Mulhai^Iv-McDermott  Fiasco 

This  generation  has  known  no  political  earthquake  like  that 
of  the  Mulhall  expose,  which  came  June  29,  1913.  The  whole 
country  was  stirred  to  the  depths  by  what  Martin  M.  Mulhall 
had  to  reveal. 

For  years  the  people  had  believed  that  Congress  was  con- 
trolled by  well-organized  special  interests.  Mr.  Mulhall's 
was  a  stirring  story  because  it  supplied  much  of  previously 
hidden  proof.  He  named  names  and  cited  incidents.  His 
statements  were  corroborated  in  important  particulars.  The 
invisible  government  at  Washington  at  last  became  partly 
visible,  even  to  the  blinded  partisan. 

The  history  of  the  lobby  investigation  by  the  House  which 
followed  might  be  divided  into  three  periods,  each  representing 
a  distinct  crisis  for  those  involved : 

First,  the  Mulhall  charges  of  corruption  against  Congress- 
men, on  June  29,  1913,  which  astounded  the  nation,  and  neces- 
sitated a  vindicating  investigation; 

Second,  the  report  of  the  investigating  committee,  five 
months  later,  on  December  9,  1913,  when  the  bi-partisan  pro- 
gram of  further  delay  was  carried  out,  and  both  discussion 
and  a  record  vote  averted,  by  steam-rollering  everything  into 
the  hands  of  another  committee;  and 


YOUR  CONGRESS  29 

Third,  the  fixing  of  a  time  for  a  final  facing  of  the  issues, 
on  July  20,  1914,  after  a  year  of  delay,  when  the  House  was 
saved  from  going  on  record  by  the  resignation  of  McDermott. 

Briefly  summarized,  the  net  results  of  the  exposure  and 
investigation  are  as  follows : 

1.  All  members  excepting  Mr.  McDermott  were  vindicated 
of  the  Mulhall  charges.  Every  one  who  understood  Congres- 
sional procedure  and  practices  expected  that. 

2.  Mr.  McDermott  was  made  the  goat,  shielded  as  long  as 
possible,  and  then  "forced"  to  resign.  Every  political  spasm 
like  the  Mulhall  expose  has  to  have  a  goat. 

3.  Action  upon  the  real  issues  of  the  investigation  was  so 
long  delayed  that  the  fine  edge  of  the  people's  indignation 
had  time  to  wear  away.  Delay  always  dulls  popular 
indignation. 

The  only  unbelievable  thing  about  it  is  that  Congress  could 
dally  along  for  a  full  year  with  about  the  most  important  issue 
it  had  faced  in  decades,  in  all  that  time  permitting  only  five 
minutes  of  discussion  and  not  a  single  roll  call.  That  is  the 
part  which  the  public  should  consider.  At  every  stage  of  the 
protracted  proceedings,  the  Mulhall-McDermott  matter  pre- 
sented questions  of  the  highest  privilege.  If  the  House  leaders 
could  keep  under  cover  for  twelve  months  the  most  highly 
privileged  matter,  what  chance  have  the  people  of  getting 
action  out  in  the  open  on  questions  of  ordinary  legislative 
routine  ? 

It  will  be  remembered  that  the  Senate  had  a  lobby  inquiry 
under  way  at  the  time  of  the  Mulhall  expose.  Thereupon  the 
Senate  committee  turned  its  lobby  investigations  in  that  direc- 
tion. The  first  few  days  of  the  Senate  inquiry  into  the  Mul- 
hall charges  seemed  to  develop  proof  of  their  accuracy.  It 
also  became  evident  that  House  members  were  involved  in  a 
serious  way.  Then,  although  the  Senate  was  already  investi- 
gating the  matter,  the  House  decided  upon  an  investigation 
of  its  own. 


30  YOUR  CONGRESS 

The  House  resolution  for  an  investigating  committee  was 
considered  July  5,  1913,  but  not  adopted  until  July  9,  an 
adjournment  being  forced  by  lack  of  a  quorum.  The  fight 
over  the  question  of  legal  assistance  for  the  committee  dem- 
onstrated the  extent  to  which  the  House  is  boss  controlled. 
Jefferson  Levy,  of  New  York,  moved  to  strike  from  the  reso- 
lution the  words  which  gave  the  committee  authority  to  em- 
ploy a  lawyer  or  lawyers  to  help  with  the  investigation.  On 
the  5th  Minority  Leader  James  R.  Mann  led  his  Republican 
followers  in  support  of  the  Levy  amendment.  When  the 
House  met  again — on  the  9th — Mr.  Mann  announced  that  he 
had  changed  his  mind,  and  moved  to  reconsider  the  vote 
whereby  the  Levy  amendment  had  been  adopted.  Practically 
every  Republican  who  had  voted  with  him  on  the  former  occa- 
sion again  followed  him  in  exactly  the  opposite  direction.  In- 
dividual thinking  and  individual  action  in  the  House  have  been 
reduced  to  the  minimum. 

The  resolution  adopted  contained  a  joker  which  proved  most 
useful  to  the  politicians  in  the  crisis  of  the  inquiry :  the  com- 
mittee was  empowered  to  investigate,  but  given  no  authority 
to  make  recommendations.  This  was  made  the  excuse  for 
the  sidestepping  of  the  House,  on  December  9,  which  will  be 
detailed  later. 

The  Committee  at  Work 

The  investigating  committee  appointed  by  Speaker  Clark 
consisted  of  Messrs.  Garrett,  of  Tennessee,  chairman;  Cline, 
of  Indiana,  Russell,  of  Missouri,  and  Roddenbery,  of  Georgia, 
Democrats;  Stafford,  of  Wisconsin,  and  Willis,  of  Ohio,  Re- 
publicans; and  Nolan,  of  California,  Progressive.  Mr.  Rod- 
denbery became  ill  and  was  replaced  by  Mr.  Ferris,  of  Okla- 
homa, early  in  the  investigation.  The  protracted  illness  of 
Mr.  Nolan  finally  compelled  his  resignation,  that  place  being 
taken  by  Mr.  MacDonald,  of  Michigan,  shortly  before  the 
committee  ended  the  taking  of  testimony. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  31 

This  select  committee  began  its  work  July  12,  1913.  The 
hearings  continued  until  September  19.  As  has  been  sug- 
gested, Mr.  McDermott  was  kept  pretty  much  in  the  limelight, 
the  press  helping  to  sensationalize  his  conduct  with  lobbyists. 
At  the  same  time  the  investigation  of  his  relations  with  the 
pawn  brokers  and  liquor  interests  was  never  carried  quite 
far  enough  to  establish  either  his  guilt,  or  more  far-reaching 
revelations  involving  other  Congressmen.  All  the  other  House 
members  brought  into  the  Mulhall  charges  were  vindicated. 

An  accident  interfered  with  the  even  course  of  the  com- 
mittee. The  illness  and  resignation  of  Mr.  Nolan  necessitated 
the  substitution  of  another  Progressive  member.  W.  J.  Mac- 
Donald  had  just  been  seated  in  the  House,  his  election  contest 
resulting  in  his  favor  August  25,  1913.  As  he  was  without 
committee  assignments  of  any  kind,  it  was  only  natural  that 
he  should  be  given  Mr.  Nolan's  place  on  the  lobby  committee. 
That  marked  a  change  in  the  proceedings.  As  soon  as  Mr. 
MacDonald  could  get  into  the  swing  of  the  inquiry,  he  began 
to  ask  questions  which  tended  to  direct  it  into  more  vital  chan- 
nels— the  underground  activities  of  the  National  Association 
of  Manufacturers.  A  few  days  later,  on  September  19,  1913, 
the  committee  terminated  its  hearings. 

The:  Bi-partisan  Machine 

The  investigating  committee  reported  to  the  House  Decem- 
ber 9,  1913.  The  majority  report,  signed  by  Finis  J.  Gar- 
rett, Cyrus  Cline,  Joe  J.  Russell,  Scott  Ferris,  Wm.  H.  Staf- 
ford and  Frank  B.  Willis,  contained  not  a  line  of  recommenda- 
tion, and  was  accompanied  by  no  resolution  upon  which  the 
House  could  act.  WiUiam  J.  MacDonald,  however,  pre- 
sented a  minority  report  and  the  following  privileged  resolu- 
tions : 

Resolved,  That  the  House  proceed  forthwith  to  determine  whether 
under  the  report  of  your  select  committee  on  lobby  investigations  it 
has  not  been  shown  that  J.  Philip  Bird,  John  Kirby,  Jr.,  James  A. 
Emery,  Martin  M.  Mulhall,  and  other  officers  and  agents  of  the  Na- 
tional Association  of  Manufacturers  have  been  engaged  in  systematic. 


32  YOUR  CONGRESS 

continuous  practices  against  the  order  and  dignity  of  the  House  and 
in  improper  and  vicious  lobbying  activities  rendering  them  liable  to 
punishment  by  this  House  for  contempt. 

Resolved,  That  this  House  proceed  forthwith  to  determine  whether 
under  the  report  of  your  select  committee  on  lobby  investigations 
Representative  James  Thomas  McDermott,  of  the  fourth  congres- 
sional district  of  the  State  of  Illinois,  has  not  been  shown  guilty  of 
disgraceful  and  dishonorable  misconduct,  and  venality,  rendering  him 
unworthy  of  a  seat  in  this  House  and  justly  liable  to  expulsion  from 
the  same. 

There  followed  a  series  of  parliamentary,  or  rather  unpar- 
liamentary, episodes  such  as  occur  but  rarely  in  the  whole 
history  of  Congress. 

First,  Mr.  MacDonald  was  jockeyed  off  the  floor,  not  being 
permitted  to  move  the  adoption  of  his  resolutions.  The  in- 
justice of  this  is  apparent  to  anyone.  The  majority  members 
of  the  committee  had  offered  no  motion  which  would  bring 
the  issues  before  the  House,  they  taking  refuge  in  the  joker 
already  referred  to  in  the  resolution  creating  the  committee. 
Neither  would  they  allow  the  dissenting  member  to  interfere 
with  the  "nothing  doing"  program. 

Second,  Mr.  Garrett  moved  that  the  MacDonald  resolu- 
tions, which  were  of  the  highest  privilege,  and  the  reports  of 
the  select  investigating  committee  be  referred  to  the  Judiciary 
Committee. 

Third,  to  shut  off  all  discussion,  the  previous  question  on 
Mr.  Garrett's  motion  was  moved  and  carried. 

Fourth,  in  the  attempt  to  get  a  record  vote  on  the  Garrett 
motion,  only  twenty-three  members,  according  to  the  official 
record,  joined  in  the  demand  for  a  roll  call.  As  thirty- four, 
or  one-fifth  of  those  present,  were  necessary  to  secure  a  roll 
call,  this  failed.  Only  the  Progressives  and  a  few  independent 
Republicans  and  Democrats  were  for  a  record  vote. 

Fifth,  only  168  members  were  present,  not  a  quorum;  but 
when  Mr.  MacDonald  made  the  point  of  order  of  no  quorum, 
which  automatically  should  have  compelled  a  roll  call  on  the 
Garrett  motion,  under  the  rules,  no  attention  was  paid  to  his 
demand.    Instead  the  House  hurriedly  adjourned. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  33 

The  Garrett  motion  had  carried  and  everything  was  steam- 
rollered into  the  hands  of  the  Judiciary  Committee,  133  to  34. 
In  this,  the  crisis  of  the  whole  Mulhall-McDermott  matter, 
there  was  neither  discussion  nor  a  record  vote. 

A  Question  of  Veracity 

Realizing  that  the  attempt  to  get  a  roll  call  on  the  Garrett 
motion  was  likely  to  be  the  last  opportunity  for  a  record  vote 
on  the  issues  of  the  lobby  investigation,  acting  for  the  Na- 
tional Voters'  League,  I  made  an  effort  in  the  only  possible 
way  to  obtain  the  names  of  those  who  had  then  signified  that 
they  were  for  open  action.  This  letter  was  sent  to  all  members 
of  the  House: 

"Dear  Congressman  :  The  National  Voters'  League  desires  to  secure 
for  publication  a  list  of  those  Members  who  joined  in  the  demand  for 
a  roll  call  on  the  question  of  referring  the  lobby  reports  and  Mr. 
MacDonald's  resolutions  to  the  Judiciary  Committee  when  that  issue 
came  up  in  the  House  December  9. 

"Will  you  aid  us  in  this  by  answering  these  questions? 

"1.  Were  you  present  in  the  House  on  that  occasion? 

"2.  Did  you  rise  and  join  in  the  demand  for  a  roll  call  on  the  above- 
mentioned  motion? 

"We  will  appreciate  an  early  answer. 
"Very  truly, 

In  response  to  this  letter  the  National  Voters'  League  has 
on  file  the  statements  of  forty-seven  members  of  the  House 
that  on  December  9,  1913,  they  arose  and  joined  in  the  demand 
for  the  roll  call  in  question.  In  addition  to  the  forty-seven, 
eight  members  were  not  certain,  but  the  majority  of  these  re- 
plied to  the  League's  query  in  such  a  way  as  to  imply  that  they 
also  had  supported  the  demand  for  the  roll  call.  One  member 
telephoned  that  he  had  voted  for  the  roll  call.  Sixteen  returned 
more  or  less  evasive  answers.  Fifty-six,  many  of  whom  said 
they  would  have  favored  the  roll  call  had  they  been  present, 
replied  that  they  were  not  in  the  House  on  that  occasion.  Two 
stated  that  they  took  no  part  in  the  proceedings  because  their 


34  YOUR  CONGRESS 

names  were  involved  in  the  Mulhall  charges.  Only  five  out  of 
the  135  who  replied  stated  that  they  were  against  the  roll  call.^* 
Here  56  members  stated  or  implied  that  they  rose  and 
joined  in  the  demand  for  a  roll  call  on  the  Garrett  motion:  the 
Congressional  Record  gives  twenty-three  as  the  number  who 
were  on  their  feet  at  that  time.  The  League  had  expected 
accurate  information  and  was  as  much  astonished  as  anyone 
at  the  discrepancy. 

Eight  Months  More:  of  Dei.ay 

The  Judiciary  Committee  kept  all  the  issues  of  the  Mulhall- 
McDermott  matter  buried  away  from  the  House  from  Decem- 
ber 9,  1913,  until  April  24,  1914.  Then  a  report  from  a  ma- 
jority of  the  committee  was  made  by  Mr.  Floyd  of  Arkansas, 
with  a  recommendation  that  Mr.  McDermott  be  censured.  The 
old  convenient  contention  that  a  member  cannot  be  more 
severely  punished  for  offenses  committed  in  and  against  a 
previous  Congress  was  embodied  in  the  report.  An  important 
thing  to  note  is  that  this  committee,  like  the  select  committee, 
kept  the  spotlight  on  Mr.  McDermott  rather  than  the  bigger 
subjects  of  the  investigation. 

Mr.  Nelson,  of  Wisconsin,  filed  a  scathing  minority  report 
from  the  Judiciary  Committee  and  recommended  Mr.  Mc- 
Dermott's  expulsion. 

The  Judiciary  Committee  delayed  action  for  five  and  one- 
half  months.  After  the  pressure  of  pubHc  opinion  had  doubt- 
less influenced  the  filing  of  a   report  from  that  committee, 


"  The  forty-seven  who  replied  definitely  that  they  joined  in  the  demand  for  a  roll  call 
are  as  follows:  Sydney  Anderson,  William  A.  Ashbrook,  Silas  R.  Barton,  Ellsworth  R. 
Bathrick,  Charles  W.  Bell.  Stanley  E.  Bowdle,  M,  E.  Burke,  Philip  P.  Campbell,  Ira  C. 
Copley,  Louis  C.  Cramton,  Charles  H.  Dillon,  Jeremiah  Donovan,  John  J.  Esch.  John  R. 
Farr,  H.  Robert  Fowler,  George  E.  Gorman,  Courtney  W,  Hamlin,  W.  H.  Hinebaugh, 
Willis  J.  Rulings,  Albert  Johnson,  Edward  Keating,  M.  Clyde  Kelly,  Thomas  F.  Konop, 
William  L.  LaFoUette,  Fred  E.  Lewis,  W.  J.  MacDonald,  James  Manahan,  Andrew  J. 
Montague,  Victor  Murdock,  William  F.  Murray,  George  A.  Neeley,  John  L  Nolan,  P.  D. 
Norton,  Dennis  O'Leary.  Percy  E.  Quin,  John  E.  Raker,  Arthur  R.  Rupley,  Dorsey  W. 
Shackleford,  R.  B.  Stevens,  Tom  Stout.  Howard  Sutherland,  H.  W.  Temple.  Charles  M. 
Thomson,  J.  B.  Thompson,  Anderson  H.  Walters,  Otis  Wingo  and  Roy  O.  Woodruff, 

The  eight  members  who  were  in  doubt,  but  the  majority  of  whom  replied  to  the  League's 
query  in  such  a  way  as  to  imply  that  they  also  demanded  the  roll  call,  are  as  follows:  Robert 
Grosser,  John  J.  Eagan,  W.  R.  Green,  E.  L.  Hamilton,  Walter  I.  McCoy,  N.  J.  Sinnott, 
Luther  W.  Mott  and  John  H.  Small. 

The  member  who  telephoned  that  he  stood  up  to  ask  for  the  roll  call  is  H.  T.  Helgesen. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  35 

there  was  a  further  delay  of  three  months,  during  which  time 
the  report  and  everything  connected  with  the  investigation 
rested  on  the  House  calendar,  zvith  only  one  member,  Mr. 
Floyd,  who  made  the  majority  report,  having  the  privilege 
of  bringing  the  matter  before  the  House.  Finally  Mr.  Floyd 
promised  to  call  up  the  report  and  gave  notice  to  the  House, 
July  20,  1914,  that  he  would  do  when  consideration  of  the 
Adamson  dam  bill  was  finished. 

Then,  after  a  year  of  total  delay,  when  there  seemed  no 
other  way  to  preclude  discussion  and  a  roll  call,  there  came 
Mr.  McDermott's  resignation.  The  sequel  to  his  retirement 
was  unfolded  in  a  meeting  of  the  Judiciary  Committee,  July 
28,  1914,  when  Mr.  Floyd  was  instructed  to  move  that  the 
whole  McDermott-Mulhall  matter  be  tabled,  which,  however, 
was  never  done. 

Why  Did  McD^rmott  Resign  ? 

The  public  knows  that  on  July  21,  1914,  James  T.  Mc- 
Dermott,  a  member  from  the  Fourth  District  of  Illinois,  re- 
signed his  seat  in  Congress.  That  is  about  as  far  as  the 
people  have  been  given  an  opportunity  to  comprehend  the 
unusual  incident. 

It  is  of  no  very  great  consequence  that  Mr.  McDermott 
retired  under  fire,  that  he  was  facing  almost  certain  censure 
and  probable  expulsion,  because  of  his  connection  with  Martin 
M.  Mulhall,  of  the  National  Association  of  Manufacturers, 
and  other  lobbyists.  The  important  thing  for  the  people  to 
know  is  the  relation  of  his  resignation  to  the  system  that  pre- 
vails in  the  House  of  Representatives. 

Mr.  McDermott's  place  in  the  Mulhall  expose  was  never  im- 
portant. He  was  the  most  insignificant  sideshow  feature.  Yet 
all  through  the  investigation  his  petty  relations  with  lobbyists 
were  so  emphasized  and  kept  before  the  public  as  to  eclipse 
the  really  consequental  issues.  However,  anomalous  as  it  may 
seem,  all  the  time  that  he  was  being  painted  a  political  pervert, 
Mr.  McDermott  apparently  was  aided  and  his  punishment 


36  YOUR  CONGRESS 

postponed  as  long  as  possible.  It  would  appear  as  though  the 
"system"  desired  to  save  him,  yet  demonstrated  so  much  of  his 
misconduct  as  might  be  necessary  to  divert  attention  from  the 
vital  phases  of  the  inquiry. 

For  more  than  a  year  Mr.  McDermott  served  that  purpose. 
Whether  designedly  or  not,  he  became  the  buffer.  Whenever 
important  issues  of  the  investigation  began  to  threaten,  the 
spotlight  played  upon  him.  When  the  House  could  no  longer 
dodge  or  delay  an  open  vote  in  any  other  way,  there  came  his 
weakly  staged  retirement.  By  his  own  confession,  borne  out 
by  circumstantial  evidence  of  the  most  convincing  kind,  Mr. 
McDermott's  resignation  could  hardly  have  been  voluntary; 
obviously  it  was  encouraged  by  his  colleagues  in  the  House 
who  did  not  dare  to  face  free  discussion  and  a  record  vote. 

By  Mr.  McDermott's  resignation,^^  the  House  was  spared 
the  politically  dangerous  vote  upon  the  question  of  his  ex- 
pulsion, which  would  have  involved  discussion  of  the  whole 
matter.  By  having  this  artificially  enlarged  scapegoat  efface 
himself,  evidently  it  was  hoped  also  to  wipe  the  slate  clean  of 
all  the  issues  of  the  Mulhall  expose. 

The  most  astounding  revelation  of  political  corruption  that 
this  generation  has  known  thus  passed  into  history  with  its 
real  issues  undecided  and  undiscussed. 

The  work  of  Mr.  MacDonald  on  the  select  investigating  com- 
mittee, and  in  his  fight  to  emphasize  and  get  open  action  on 
the  vital  phases  of  the  inquiry,  stands  out  conspicuously.  Mr. 
Nelson's  fight  within  the  Judiciary  Committee  was  of  the  same 
high  courageous  order.  The  public  should  bestow  unstinted 
credit  upon  men  who  persist  in  opposing  the  all-powerful,  bi- 
partisan organization  in  such  matters  which  mean  life  or  death 
to  the  system. 

The  Progressives,  led  by  Messrs.  MacDonald,  Murdock  and 
Kelly  of  Pennsylvania,  bore  the  brunt  of  the  fight  to  compel 
all  members  to  go  on  record  in  the  crisis  of  the  controversy. 

i»  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Mr.  McDermott  was  reelected  to  Congress.     Help  in  his 
reelection  was  undoubtedly  a  part  of  the  bargaining  in  his  resignation. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  37 

Had  it  not  been  for  the  determined  vigilance  of  no  more 
than  a  half-dozen  members,  the  bi-partisan  program  in  refer- 
ence to  the  Mulhall-McDermott  matter  would  in  all  prob- 
ability have  been  consummated  without  the  least  hindrance. 
As  it  was,  of  course,  all  the  fighting  was  futile.  The  struggle 
to  eliminate  sham,  secure  adequate  discussion  and  obtain  record 
votes,  will  always  be  futile  until  the  parliamentary  practices 
of  the  House  are  shifted  from  bossism  to  a  basis  of  demo- 
cratic deliberation. 

There  is  a  temptation  to  continue  these  recitals  of  the  poli- 
ticians at  play.  Their  purpose  has  been  to  supply  samples  of 
Congressional  atmosphere,  to  suggest  how  the  plunder  and  ex- 
pediencies of  politics  outweigh  all  other  elements  in  legislation. 
The  great  need  of  this  day  and  hour  is  a  subordination  of  the 
interests  of  professional  politicians  to  the  common  welfare. 
The  business  of  politics  should  give  way  to  the  business  of 
government. 


CHAPTER  II 

MODERN   POLITICS— AN   INTERPRETATION 

Big  politics,  more  than  big  business,  is  the  immediate  and 
common  problem  which  we  have  to  face. 

Politics  is  the  gateway  to  everything  government  has  to 
offer  or  to  withhold  from  the  people.  At  present  no  real 
advancement  in  industrial  conditions,  no  vital  change  in  gov- 
ernment, can  come  excepting  through  political  action.  No 
economic  theory,  no  moral  idea,  can  become  a  reality  except- 
ing through  the  instrumentality  of  politics.  And  that  is  the 
only  legitimate  function  that  politics  has — to  serve  as  the 
agency  for  the  application  of  economic  and  moral  principles 
to  the  life  of  the  people.  Politics  should  be  only  the  means 
to  that  end;  but  modern  political  organization  has  become  an 
end  in  itself.  This  end  is  office  and  the  ever-increasing  per- 
quisites of  office. 

In  the  last  short  session  of  the  Sixty-third  Congress  there 
were  passed  244  bills  and  resolutions.  Of  this  number  229 
related  to  one  or  both  of  the  basic  elements  in  the  political 
system — patronage  and  pork.  Less  than  thirty  were  measures 
in  which  the  general  public  had  an  interest.  Adding  such 
perenni'di  incidents  as  the  mileage  grab  and  misappropriated 
clerk  hire,  and  special  events  like  the  sham  attempt  to  make 
members  earn  their  salaries  and  the  Mulhall-McDermott  mat- 
ter, one  gets  a  startling,  but  not  an  unfair,  picture  of  the 
American  Congress  in  action. 

Congress  is  the  source  and  center  of  practically  all  that  is 
perversive  in  modern  politics.  The  situation  in  the  national 
legislature  may  be  illustrated  in  the  diagram  on  the  opposite 
page. 

The  darkened  space  represents,  comparatively,  the  portion 
of  the  law-making  field  occupied  by  the  system  for  itself,  an 
overwhelming  preponderance  of  Congressional  attention  being 
38 


YOUR  CONGRESS 


39 


given  to  matters  involving  the  selfish  interests  of  the  poli- 
ticians as  such — spoils,  patronage,  pork  barrel  projects,  and 
all  manner  of  log  rolling  bills  which  strengthen  the  members 
in  their  hold  upon  the  positions  and  perquisites  of  public  life. 

THE  FIELD  OF  CON6RESSIOA/AI     60V£/iJV/YIBr^r 

IdhortegislaHon 
Suffrage 


u 


UM=&Jr*JK«kl 


I  Patron 


HESS^S 


7/igh  wSyOeveJcfmerzi 
Publfc  Ownership 
Socialism 
Single  Tax 
Prohib/'iiorz 
5oc23?  Questions 
f/lacbinsry  of6av. 
Conservdthn  Issues 


Darke-necL  Space.  -Fori  ion  of  fie  Id.  Light  ^pacesrCon  ^ideraiion 

Occupied  by  Poliiiciansfor  PoiiUcsl    Given  Economic  and,  (rov- 
Ends.  '  erriTnenial  Questions. 


A  few  of  many  economic  and  governmental  questions  de- 
pendent upon  legislation  are  suggested  in  the  white  spaces  at 
the  right  of  the  drawing.  The  size  of  these  spaces  indicates  as 
closely  as  can  be  estimated  the  time  given  to  each  as  com- 
pared with  the  attention  given  to  purely  political  questions — 
to  the  system  itself. 

It  will  be  noted  that  labor  legislation  occupies  a  larger 
space  than  any  other  subject,  with  conservation  issues  next  in 
size.  Such  questions  received  greater  attention,  at  least  greater 
talk,  because  the  labor  and  conservation  movements  had  made 
them  conspicuous  in  the  public  mind:  Congress  turns,  almost 
automatically,  where  publicity  directs.  At  the  same  time, 
issues  in  the  limelight  are  the  ones  in  which  there  enters  the 
greater  proportion  of  duplicity,  of  personal  and  partisan 
politics. 

At  present  the  whole  combined  force  of  the  entrenched 
political  plunder  system  is  massed  as  a  buffer  against  every 


40  YOUR  CONGRESS 

separate  economic  or  governmental  idea.  For  the  most  part, 
each  economic  group  is  struggling  alone  against  the  forces  of 
politics,  often  in  addition  fighting  other  economic  groups. 

Before  there  can  be  any  substantial  economic  change,  all 
must  unite  to  light  up  and  liberate  that  portion  of  the  field 
now  occupied  by  the  parasitic  political  system.  That  is  com- 
mon fighting  ground  for  every  legitimate  legislative  interest 
in  America  today.  The  millions  who  through  instinct  or  nec- 
essity desire  industrial  democracy  must  first  join  forces  in 
the  fight  for  political  democracy. 

Whatever  is  national  in  scope  must  come  out  of  Congress. 
Congress  as  at  present  constituted  and  controlled  is  99  per 
cent  politics — perverted  politics.  Politics  is  always  the  first 
and  last  and  intermediate  consideration.  Economics,  national 
morality,  the  common  welfare,  are  only  incidental.  The  first 
concern  of  every  legitimate  economic  and  moral  interest  should 
be  to  reverse  this  relationship.  Then  only  can  there  come  a 
fair,  out-in-the-open  consideration  and  choice  among  economic 
principles. 

The  great  economic  problem  today  is  the  labor  question, 
but  until  the  hold  of  the  political  system  upon  Congress  is 
broken  there  can  come  no  adequate  and  lastingly  equitable 
changes  in  that  field. 

Those  who  embrace  socialism  as  the  best  economic  doctrine 
are  confronted  with  the  same  political  problem :  No  part  of 
the  national  ownership  program  will  be  possible  excepting 
through  Congressional  action. 

Advocates  of  the  single  tax  face  the  same  necessity  for  act- 
ing through  perverted  political  agencies. 

You  may  regard  equal  suffrage,  or  social  legislation  such 
as  old  age  pensions,  or  prohibition,  or  conservation,  or  national 
highways,  as  of  chief  importance;  whatever  your  interests, 
if  national  in  scope,  they  can  be  realized  only  through  Congres- 
sional, which  means  political,  action. 

Many  hold  that  governmental  institutions  must  be  changed, 


YOUR  CONGRESS  41 

that  the  machinery  of  government  should  be  made  more  demo- 
cratic :  in  the  field  of  ''popular  government"  the  same  common 
problem  appears,  only  more  perplexing  because  attended  by 
more  duplicity  and  double  dealing.  A  national  initiative  and 
referendum  can  come  only  out  of  a  Congress  in  which  poli- 
tics and  political  objects  occupy  the  center  of  the  stage.  It  is 
the  same  with  a  gateway  amendment  to  the  Constitution,  and 
proportional  representation,  and  a  one-branch  legislature.  Even 
the  changes  that  would  help  to  change  Congress  must  come 
out  of  Congress — where  politics  and  politicians  dominate  in 
their  own  interests,  which  are  not  public  interests. 

Politics,  the  servant,  the  incidental  thing,  has  grown  so 
great  as  to  overshadow  and  subordinate  all  else  in  government. 
The  problem,  then,  the  first  task  of  all  groups,  regardless 
of  conflicting  economic  convictions,  is  to  unite  to  break  up  the 
vicious,  bi-partisan  political  plunder  system,  and  reduce  poli- 
tics back  to  its  only  legitimate  function,  that  of  serving  as  the 
instrumentality  for  the  application  of  economic  and  moral 
principles  to  the  common  welfare  of  the  people. 

Patronage 

This  perverted,  end-in-itself,  political  plunder  system  has 
two  basic  elements:  (1)  Patronage,  and  (2)  the  pork  barrel. 

Patronage  means  political  machinery,  political  work  at  public 
expense  for  the  benefit  of  professional  politicians.  This  type 
of  spoils  is  of  two  kinds:  (1)  The  positions  and  perquisites 
controlled  by  the  Congressional  machine,  and  (2)  the  thou- 
sands and  thousands  of  offices  filled  by  presidential  appoint- 
ment. Both  kinds  are  directly  related  to  legislation  and  used 
to  control  legislation. 

Congressional  plunder  will  be  discussed  later.  It  consists 
chiefly  in  choice  committee  places,  which  carry  with  them  much 
politically  important  prestige  and  many  special  privileges, 
such  as  extra  clerks  to  do  at  public  expense  the  personal  and 
personally  political  business  of  those  getting  the  plums.     This 


42  YOUR  CONGRESS 

form  of  patronage  resolves  itself  into  subtle  briberies  by 
which  those  in  control  of  the  spoils  buy  human  material  for 
their  bi-partisan  machine. 

The  other  and  more  far-reaching  branch  of  patronage,  that 
at  the  disposal  of  the  President,  who  in  that  capacity  acts 
as  the  head  of  the  dominant  political  organization,  is  usually 
parceled  out  by  cabinet  members  or  "unofficial  advisers" 
through  Congressmen  and  Senators,  thus  vitally  touching  the 
sources  of  legislation. 

The  Pork  BarreIv 

The  pork  barrel,  a  form  of  plunder  closely  related  to  patron- 
age, is  another  corner-stone  of  the  system.  Impelled  by  politi- 
cal necessity,  each  member  seeks  to  secure  for  his  district 
and  for  influential  individuals  and  classes  in  his  district  every- 
thing possible  at  public  expense.  The  Congressional  machine, 
in  control  of  the  "pork,"  can  parcel  out  or  withhold  it  accord- 
ing to  the  measure  of  the  members'  allegiance  to  their  sys- 
tem. There  are  from  twelve  to  fifteen  separate  appropriation 
measures  in  every  regular  session.  The  corruptions  of  the 
pork  barrel  permeate  each  of  them  and  ramify  in  all  direc- 
tions from  all  of  them.  In  addition,  thousands  of  bills  are 
presented,  and  many  of  them  become  laws,  which  give  more 
private  and  personal  expression  to  the  pork  barrel  element. 
Pensions,  public  buildings,  local  improvements,  road,  rivers, 
harbors,  Indian  affairs,  salary  manipulations  and  war  muni- 
tions are  included. 

The  currency  of  politics  is  not  the  gold  and  silver  of  com- 
merce. It  is  office.  Therefore  the  object  of  each  member  who 
is  a  regular  and  orthodox  politician  is  to  get  every  possible 
personal  and  political  advantage  from  these  appropriation  bills. 
In  the  final  analysis  personal  and  political  mean  the  same 
thing.  Whatever  a  member  obtains  for  his  constituents  under 
this  system  in  reality  he  gets  for  himself,  because  the  favor 
of  the  voters  reacts  to  continue  him  in  public  position.     The 


YOUR  CONGRESS  48 

general  public,  directly  and  in  a  thousand  indirections,  pays 
for  it  all.  Through  this  monstrous  trading  system,  the  legiti- 
mate interests  of  the  whole  country  are  sacrificed  to  exalt 
professional,  pie-and-pork  politicians,  to  perpetuate  their 
system. 

Likewise  the  Congressman  who  is  a  regular,  aside  from 
petty  spoils  such  as  misappropriated  clerk  hire,  gets  little  or 
nothing  of  a  direct  money  value  from  patronage.  His  interest 
in  patronage  is  purely  political ;  it  contributes  at  public  expense 
to  his  election  and  retention  in  office.  Office  means  ''honor" — 
to  small-sized  men  a  great  thing — and  the  salary  of  the  posi- 
tion, which  in  most  cases  is  more  than  he  could  earn  in  private 
life.  To  secure  and  retain  public  position  is  the  object  of 
those  with  patronage  to  disburse.  The  smaller  beneficiary  of 
patronage  feels  the  same  way.  Here  we  get  the  connection. 
Those  individuals  whose  appointive  positions  are  dependent 
upon  the  political  success  of  a  Congressman  labor,  without 
cost  to  him,  for  his  election.  More  than  that,  much,  and  in 
some  cases  all,  of  the  time  of  those  receiving  appointments  to 
public  position  is  afterward  given  to  practical  politics.  This 
means  political  organization — perpetual  political  work,  for 
which  the  public  pays.  Most  of  the  waste  and  inefficiencies 
of  governmental  service  are  due  to  this  cause.  Office  is  held 
to  be  a  political  and  not  a  public  trust. 

There  is  one  distinctive  difference  between  patronage  and 
pork.  The  pork  barrel  merges  directly  into  another  problem, 
the  greatest  of  all;  that  is,  the  wholesale  manipulation  of 
public  opinion  in  reference  to  everything  political.  Legis- 
lators bend  every  energy  to  get  pork  barrel  results  because 
those  results  create  the  impression  at  home  that  they  are  influ- 
ential and  working  for  the  "best"  interests  of  their  district. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  those  members  who  obtain  most  for 
powerful  interests  and  individuals  invariably  do  so  through 
the  trading  and  sacrifice  of  all  that  should  be  held  sacred 
for  the  welfare  of  the  public  as  a  whole;  they  are  the  most 


44  YOUR  CONGRESS 

servile  and  inconsequential  when  measured  by  the  standard  of 
real  public  service.  But  the  selfish  interests  of  those  who 
gain  through  pork  blind  them  to  this  truth.  Therein  lies  the 
duplicity,  the  perversion  of  public  opinion. 

Pe:rversion  op  Pubuc  Opinion 

In  this  connection,  we  have,  all  unknown  to  ourselves,  en- 
tered upon  a  new  political  epoch.  Formerly  those  who  profited 
from  the  control  of  government  depended  upon  the  old  Tam- 
many style  of  politics — the  colonization  of  voters,  the  stealing 
and  stuffing  of  ballots,  the  bribery  of  legislators  and  execu- 
tives and  judges.  Now,  except  in  rare  localities,  such  crude 
means  are  being  abandoned.  For  a  decade  professional  poli- 
ticians have  been  employing  the  subtler,  safer  way  of  getting 
the  same  results  by  so  manipulating  public  opinion  that  the 
voters  would  support  their  system  and  their  servants,  at  the 
same  time  believing  that  their  own  interests  were  being 
advanced. 

I  am  not  arraigning  the  army  of  small  political  individuals, 
but  the  system  itself.  Those  who  naturally  and  by  character 
adjust  themselves  to  the  prevailing  deceptions  of  politics  are 
a  minority.  But  those  who  view  the  aims  and  ends  of  politics 
as  secondary  to  public  interests  are  forced  also  to  practice 
duplicities,  to  pose  and  play,  in  order  to  survive.  You  cannot 
find  anywhere  in  the  Congressional  Record  of  the  last  Con- 
gress a  set  speech  in  which  personal  or  party  politics  did  not 
enter.  Always,  in  whatever  is  said  or  done,  the  object  is 
to  get  political  results — to  win  or  hold  the  votes  of  the  people. 
The  system  makes  it  so. 

Politicians  are  good  and  bad.  So  far  as  the  distant  people 
may  judge,  it  is  practically  impossible  to  choose  between  the 
good  and  the  bad,  for  which  political  control  of  public  opinion 
is  responsible.  Take  such  a  question  as  the  initiative  and  ref- 
erendum, for  example.  I  know  politicians  in  Congress  and  in 
State  legislatures,  representing  the  very  worst  elements  of  our 


YOUR  CONGRESS  45 

political  life,  who  pose  as  leaders  in  the  movement  for  popular 
government.  Public  sentiment  is  so  misdirected  as  to  exalt 
their  shamming  into  actuality.    That  is  the  purpose  of  it. 

This  manipulation  of  public  opinion  might  be  divided  into 
two  grades,  major  and  minor — general  and  local.  In  the 
larger  field,  politicians  and  the  press  are  inseparable.  The 
relation  is  so  natural,  so  necessary,  that  most  professional 
office  seekers  and  office  holders  have  control  over  publicity 
channels — in  many  cases  as  direct  as  that  of  ownership.  In 
big  matters,  such  as  the  making  of  presidential  candidates,  the 
system  can  and  does  mask  professional  politicians  with  almost 
any  character  they  choose.  On  the  other  hand,  those  inclined 
to  independence  can  be  belittled  and  ridiculed  out  of  public 
life.  Today,  with  public  opinion  controlled  as  it  is,  there  is  not 
the  remotest  chance  for  a  Lincoln  to  come  up  out  of  obscurity 
to  influence  our  national  tendencies,  even  for  an  hour.  Politi- 
cal control  of  public  opinion  is  so  thorough  that  only  politicians 
can  survive.  It  is  difficult  of  proof,  but  without  doubt  there 
exists  an  unseen  and  unseeable  organization  of  opinion-mold- 
ing agencies.  Beyond  doubt  this  concert  of  controlled  pub- 
licity is  employed  to  direct  public  thought  toward  certain 
definite  selfish  aims  of  politicians  and  away  from  objects  of 
opposite  importance. 

But  when  one  comes  to  consider  the  manipulation  of  pub- 
lic opinion  in  the  narrower,  local  sense,  all  shadows  and  vague- 
ness disappear.  Individual  Congressmen  and  Senators  have 
at  their  disposal  every  conceivable  opportunity  to  practice 
duplicity  in  respect  to  their  own  public  service.  There  is 
wholesale  abuse  of  the  franking  privilege — members  may  com- 
municate at  any  time  and  in  almost  any  way  with  their  con- 
stituents at  public  expense.  They  engage  in  cheap  advertising 
schemes  through  this  means.  They  frank  free  seeds  to  the 
voters.  They  get  leave  to  print  speeches,  often  written  by 
someone  else,  and  these  are  franked  broadcast.  They  intro- 
duce all  sorts  of  local  bills,  which   are  purely   for  political 


46  YOUR  CONGRESS 

effect,  rarely  being  pressed  beyond  the  point  of  introduction. 
They  share  in  all  the  ramifications  of  the  pork  barrel.  The 
system  is  such  that  the  member  can  keep  in  touch  with  and 
appear  to  do  something  for  every  community  and  influential 
class  in  his  district — all  at  public  expense — all  tending  to  give 
him  such  false  character  and  standing  that  he  will  be  con- 
tinued in  office. 

Bi-partisanship 

This  wholesale  manipulation  of  public  opinion  is  aided,  it  is 
almost  founded  upon,  the  blind  personal  bias  and  prejudices 
of  the  voters,  which  is  partisanship.  Ninety  per  cent  of  our 
political  ills,  back  of  which  is  practically  every  industrial 
inequity  that  exists,  are  due  to  the  paradoxical  facts  that  the 
voters  are  partisan  and  the  politicians  are  not. 

The  political  plunder  system  is  bi-partisan.  In  all  proba- 
bility it  would  include  the  leaders  of  more  than  two  great 
political  organizations,  if  there  were  more  than  two  with  any 
considerable  representation  in  Congress.  A  Tammany  Hall 
politician  once  was  asked  how  Tammany  got  on  with  the 
Republicans.  He  answered:  "Oh,  we  fight  some  on  little 
things  like  the  tariff,  but  we  agree  on  the  main  issue,  that 
them  as  works  in  politics  is  entitled  to  make  a  living  out  of 
it,"  which  tells  the  whole  story. 

There  is,  of  course,  some  partisan  strife  as  to  which  party 
shall  control  the  spoils,  but  none  as  to  the  plunder  itself.  And, 
so  far  as  the  people  are  concerned,  plunder  is  the  important 
issue,  not  those  who  enjoy  it  at  public  expense.  This  slightly 
confusing  distinction  may  be  illustrated  in  a  parallel  case. 
With  two  brewery  firms,  their  rivalary  extends  only  to  the  sale 
of  beer.  The  question  of  prohibition  brings  both  together  at 
once.  And  to  those  interested  in  the  abolition  of  liquor,  prohi- 
bition is  the  issue,  not  which  particular  brewery  does  the  busi- 
ness. Rival  breweries  may  vie  with  each  other  over  the  sale 
of  beer,  but  they  are  always  agreed  as  to  beer  as  an  institution. 
It  is  the  same  with  professional  politicians  of  rival  parting  in 


YOUR  CONGRESS  47 

respect  to  their  plunder.  Each  party  is  better  fed  in  than 
out;  therefore  each  seeks  as  honestly  as  their  motives  will 
permit  to  control  and  enjoy  the  spoils  of  office.  But  there  is 
never  a  thought  of  antagonism  to  the  spoils  system ;  the  regular 
leaders  of  both  old  parties  would  no  more  do  anything  to 
disturb  plunder  as  a  basic  institution  of  politics  than  would 
breweries  work  for  national  prohibition.  There  are  party 
controversies — for  the  most  part  sham  battles,  shrewdly 
staged — but  in  everything  that  concerns  the  politicians  and 
their  plunder  the  leaders  of  both  old  parties  seem  to  work  in 
perfect  agreement.  The  following  chapter  contains  many  con- 
clusive illustrations  of  this  fact. 

The  political  plunder  system  could  not  exist  if  it  were  not 
bi-partisan.  If  the  rivalry  were  real,  the  minority  party  would 
always  expose  the  plundering  of  the  majority;  the  outs  would 
invariably  unmask  the  ins.  Publicity  then  would  cure  the 
evil:  plunder  can  exist  only  in  darkness.  The  very  beginning 
of  the  political  plunder  system,  its  primary  and  most  crucial 
element,  therefore,  is  bi-partisanship. 

Here,  then,  is  the  situation  we  have  to  consider :  government 
is  the  all-important  element  in  human  life.  Politics  is  the  only 
existing  instrumentality  through  which  the  objects  of  govern- 
ment can  be  translated  into  common  welfare.  The  agency 
functions  of  politics  are  corrupted  and  perverted,  by  pork  and 
patronage,  into  an  end  in  itself.  This  perversion,  founded 
upon  the  unseeing  bias  and  prejudices  of  partisanship  among 
voters,  is  made  complete  by  the  wholesale  manipulation  and 
misdirection  of  public  opinion.  The  deception  is  crowned 
completely  by  a  bi-partisan  harmony  of  purpose  and  program 
among  professional  politicians. 

The  obvious  thing  to  do  is  to  take  away  from  politics  its 
duplicities,  its  perversions,  and  make  it  the  agency,  not  the  end, 
of  government.     How  can  this  be  done? 


48  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Politics  and  Busine:ss 

The  weakness  of  those  attempting  reform  has  been  two- 
fold: (1)  they  have  failed  to  see  the  end-in-itself  character 
of  modern  politics;  and  (2)  they  have  never  presented  an 
adequate  constructive  program  of  remedies.  The  two  must 
go  together.  The  muck-raking  of  the  last  decade  yielded  little 
more  than  a  reaction  in  the  public  mind  for  the  reason  that  it 
lacked  a  constructive  program. 

The  big  object  of  this  little  book  is  to  point  the  way  out,  to 
outline  constructive  remedies.  These  remedies  will  go  no 
further  than  politics.  I  shall  not  in  any  way  deal  with  eco- 
nomic questions.  Great,  deeply  rooted  moral  and  industrial 
inequities  exist,  but  I  believe  that  "big  politics,"  rather  than 
*'big  business,"  is  the  immediate  problem — that  it  will  be 
possible  to  reach  and  rectify  economic  conditions  if  politics 
first  be  reformed,  if  the  means  and  machinery  to  that  end  be 
provided.  To  attempt  economic  changes  with  the  political 
machinery  at  hand  would  be  as  futile  and  foolish  as  would  be 
the  harvesting  of  wheat  with  the  ancestral  sickle. 

The  political  system  is,  of  course,  the  source  and,  through 
its  failures,  the  cause  of  our  chief  industrial  difficulties.  No 
one  will  dispute  that.  That  is  why  government  means  so 
much  to  the  individual  in  dollars  and  cents.  Special  interests 
seeking  great  governmental  favors  are  still  dependent  upon 
politics,  but  politics  has  become  more  and  more  independent 
of  "big  business,"  more  and  more  an  end  in  itself.  It  has  its 
own  complete  circle,  with  certain  streams  of  influence  and 
power  flowing  from  the  people,  through  the  professional  poli- 
ticians, to  Congress,  and  certain  other  disguised  and  colored 
streams  reaching  back  from  Congress  to  the  people.  Special 
interests  are  coming  in  contact  with  a  constantly  decreasing 
number  of  politicians.  The  leaders,  the  big  bosses,  are  about 
the  only  ones  with  whom  they  now  need  to  deal  directly. 

Real  predatory  interests  could  hardly  exist  without  modern 
politics,  but  politics  could  get  on  very  well  without  the  prac- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  49 

tical  support  of  special  interests,  because  it  has  a  perverted 
system  complete  in  itself,  based  on  office  and  the  spoils  of 
office. 

Th^  Fundamentals  of  Political  Rei'orm 

The  reconstruction  of  modern  politics,  its  demotion  from 
principal  to  agent  in  government,  must  be  brought  about 
through  three  concerted  influences:  (1)  publicity,  the  estab- 
lishment of  permanently  open  avenues  of  honest,  compre- 
hensive information,  which  is  an  educational  and  fundamental 
necessity  if  the  personnel  of  the  public  service  is  to  be  im- 
proved; (2)  the  substitution  of  the  independent,  non-partisan, 
anti-spoils  balance  of  power  position  in  elections  and  legisla- 
tion for  partyism,  which  is  fundamentally  constructive  and 
necessary,  if  politics  is  to  be  shorn  of  its  end-in-itself  char- 
acter; and  (3)  an  adequate  constructive  program  of  parlia- 
mentary and  institutional  reform  in  legislative  bodies,  through 
which  alone  can  come  light  and  honesty  and  efficiency  in  the 
doing  of  public  business. 

In  Chapter  VI  there  is  outlined  a  way  to  secure  honest 
information,  instead  of  the  perverted  publicity  now  almost 
wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  self-interested  political  system.  The 
great  problem  in  this  respect  is  to  bridge  the  long,  mysterious 
distance  between  Congress  and  the  people.  That  is  one  of 
the  big  objects  of  the  National  Voters'  League — to  study  the 
national  legislature  as  a  whole,  to  reduce  its  activities  down 
to  individuals,  and  then  to  reveal  each  Representative  and 
Senator  to  his  constitutents  exactly  according  to  his  record  in 
public  life. 

Chapter  VI  also  outlines  a  method  of  dealing  with  the  bi- 
partisan combination,  which  of  course  means  the  political 
system.  There  are  only  two  basic  principles  upon  which  the 
work  of  reforming  politics  can  be  founded:  one  is  to  work- 
through  political  parties,  in  an  attempt  to  control  the  prevailing 
party ;  the  other  is  to  secure  the  balance  of  power  in  elections, 
and  legislation.    The  first  means  politics,  the  second  a  breaking 


50  YOUR  CONGRESS 

up  of  politics.  If  orthodox  political  results  are  the  objects 
to  be  obtained,  by  all  means  choose  to  work  through  modern 
political  organization.  If  moral,  or  economic,  or  vital  govern- 
mental changes  are  sought,  the  independent  position,  the 
balance  of  power,  is  the  one  to  take.  This  is  fundamental.  It 
is  one  of  the  big  ideas  underlying  all  advancement  in  American 
goveri^ment  today.  Yet  hardly  a  handful  of  people  compre- 
hend its  importance. 

Parliamentary  reconstruction  must  naturally  precede  both 
adequate  educational  publicity  and  a  change  in  our  attitude 
toward  partyism,  because  only  through  this  lifting  of  the 
curtain  can  their  meaning  be  made  clear.  Parliamentary 
reconstruction  means  rules  reform.  Rules  reform  implies  no 
more  and  no  less  than  simple  honesty  and  efficiency  in  the 
conduct  of  the  public  business.  It  means  the  substituting  of 
daylight  for  darkness,  the  divorcing  of  the  spoils  of  politics 
and  legislation.  In  Chapter  V^,  after  a  detailed  diagnosis 
of  parliamentary  conditions,  rules  reform  remedies  will  be 
outlined. 

The  interrelations  of  these  three  lines  of  political  reform 
must  be  kept  in  mind.  There  can  be  no  adequate  publicity,  no 
clear  understanding  of  conditions,  without  rules  reform,  until 
dark  spots  in  the  procedure  are  lighted  up.  When  professional 
politicians  are  driven  into  the  open,  and  the  plunder  of  politics 
revealed,  then  only  will  the  voters  be  able  to  discriminate  in 
their  own  interest  in  the  choice  of  pubHc  servants.  But  even 
with  light  and  honest  information,  the  voters  will  fail  so  long 
as  their  vision  remains  distorted  by  the  bias  and  prejudices  of 
partisanship.  There  must  be  recognition  of  the  crucial  fact 
that  partyism  means  political  objects  rather  than  public  service. 
Then  will  come  the  practical  part,  to  work  for  the  public 
interest,  as  the  politicians  now  do  for  their  own  political  ends, 
through  the  balance  of  power  in  elections  and  legislation. 

Parliamentary  reform  is  the  crucial  point  of  attack.  The 
parliamentary  system  of  the  House  of  Representatives  is  the 


YOUR  CONGRESS  51 

politicians'  melting  pot.  Into  it  they  pour  the  powers  and 
privileges  which  the  votes  of  the  people  have  given  them;  out 
of  it  come  influences  which  deceive  the  people  into  continual 
support  of  the  same  politicians  and  the  same  system.  Other- 
wise politics  could  not  be  an  end  in  itself. 

To  change  the  parliamentary  conditions  of  Congress,  substi- 
tuting light  where  now  there  is  darkness,  taking  power  from 
the  few  and  placing  it  in  the  keeping  of  the  majority,  estab- 
lishing regular  order  and  substituting  regular,  orderly  pro- 
cedure for  the  extraordinary  boss  proceedings  that  now  pre- 
vail, divorcing  legislation  from  the  plunders  of  politics — this 
is  the  first  and  most  necessary  step  in  political  reform.  By 
this  means  the  professional  politicians  would  be  driven  out  of 
their  entranchments.     Politicians  will  not  fight  in  the  open. 

Chapter  V  presents  a  constructive  program  of  rules  reform. 
Before  adequate  remedies  could  be  conceived,  it  was  neces- 
sary to  make  two  prehminary  studies:  first,  of  the  history  of 
attempts  at  rules  reform  during  the  the  last  decade;  and, 
second,  of  the  existing  parliamentary  conditions  which  are  in 
need  of  reconstruction.  We  will  cover  the  preliminary  ground 
in  that  order,  next  considering  insurgency  within  Congress. 
Insurgency  is  only  another  name  for  rules  reform.  All  the 
recent  attempts  at  parliamentary  reconstruction  are  included 
in  the  story  of  House  insurgency. 


INSURGENCY 

The  insurgent  in  public  life  is  an  individual  who  instinctively, 
or  through  vision,  understands  that  office  and  the  spoils  of  office 
have  become  the  chief  ends  of  politics.  He  may  or  may  not  be 
radical  in  an  economic  sense;  economic  attitude  rarely  enters  into 
it.  The  element  that  determines  the  true  insurgent  is  his  willing- 
ness to  face  political  disgrace  and  death  rather  than  to  live  the  lie 
of  pretended  public  service  when  the  public  actually  is  serving  him. 

It  should  be  easy  for  the  citizen  to  be  an  insurgent.  Individ- 
ually, and  as  a  whole,  the  people  have  no  interest  in  the  plunder  of 
politics,  excepting  to  end  its  cost  and  corruptions.  Self-interest 
should  prompt  the  rank  and  file  to  adopt  the  insurgent,  or  balance 
of  power,  position.  But  when  a  m.an  in  public  life  takes  that 
position  and  becomes  independent  of  prevailing  political  prac- 
tices, he  divorces  himself  from  all  those  influences  through  which 
ninety-nine  of  every  hundred  advance  in  the  political  world. 
The  last  decade  has  seen  hundreds  of  political  insurgents;  less 
than  a  dozen  have  survived.  Many  remain  who  pose  as  inde- 
pendents, but  these  have  made  secret  peace  with  the  political  powers 
that  be:  like  the  regulars  who  wear  no  mask,  they  eat  and  drink  of 
the  sustaining  plunder. 

Insurgency  has  never  been  fully  comprehended  or  appreciated, 
because  we  have  failed  to  see  that  plunder,  not  public  service,  was 
the  cornerstone  of  the  end-in-itself  political  system.  With  m^odern 
politics  as  a  background,  it  becomes  possible  to  see  in  insurgency 
the  only  highway  to  practical  public  service.  In  itself  it  embodies 
two  of  the  three  fundamental  remedies  for  bad  political  conditions: 
(1)  rules  reform;  and  (2)  the  independent,  anti-partisan,  anti- 
spoils,  balance  of  power  position,  both  in  elections  and  legislation. 
And  insurgency  also  has  contributed  more  to  the  third  fundamental 
requisite  of  reform — educational  publicity — than  all  other  forward 
influences  combined. 


52 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  EBB  AND  FLOW  OF  INSURGENCY 

Progressivism  in  this  country,  although  since  gone  far 
astray,  had  its  origin  and  impetus  in  insurgency  within  legis- 
lative bodies. 

Out  on  the  prairies  of  Alinnesota  I  remember  a  time  when 
the  people  waited,  day  by  day,  for  developments  to  come  out 
of  Congress.  The  things  for  which  we  watched  and  waited 
were  not  tariffs  nor  currency  bills.  They  were  the  issues  of 
fights  against  entrenched  stand-pat  machines — La  FoUette  in 
his  political  life-and-death  struggle  with  the  old  Senate 
oligarchy,  the  contests  of  men  like  Lindbergh  and  Nelson  and 
Norris  and  Murdock  with  Cannonism.  Those  were  the  issues 
that  stirred  the  thinking  voters.  Perhaps  we  did  not  then 
understand  the  meaning  of  insurgency.  We  may  not  at  that 
time  have  seen  clearly  the  shams  of  partisanship,  nor  compre- 
hended how  the  clubs  of  patronage  and  pork  were  holding  the 
threatened  revolt  to  a  handful  of  pioneers.  But  we  did  know, 
instinctively,  that  insurgency  was  a  protest  against  a  bad 
political  system,  that  it  evidenced  something  righteous  and 
vital  in  American  public  life. 

Those  early  insurgent  struggles  centered  about  parlia- 
mentary questions.  Remember  that.  The  parliamentary 
system  of  Congress  was  then  the  source  of  all  the  larger 
vicious  influences  that  contributed  to  existing  political  condi- 
tions. It  is  even  more  so  today.  In  the  last  decade  parlia- 
mentary conditions  have  steadily  gone  from  bad  to  worse. 

The  politicians  know  this.  Their  duplicities  in  parlia- 
mentary matters  constitute  a  confession  of  it.  At  one  time 
or  another  practically  every  member  has  voiced  and  voted  his 
opposition  to  some  phase  of  the  system;  yet  nothing  has  been 
done.  By  every  artifice  of  politics  they  have  contrived  to 
prevent  parliamentary  changes,  thus  safeguarding  their  plun- 

53 


54  YOUR  CONGRESS 

der,  although  simultaneously  posing  as  in  favor  of  rules 
reform.  The  very  situations  that  promoted  a  greater  degree 
of  bossism  and  of  darkness  were  so  manipulated  that  the 
politicians  responsible  might  appear  as  favoring  exactly  oppo- 
site tendencies,  changes  which  would  light  up  and  democratize 
the  proceedings.  More  hypocrisy  and  double  dealing  has 
attended  the  handling  of  rules  reform  questions  than  all  other 
subjects  before  Congress. 

Those  responsible  for  present  conditions  understand  that 
their  position  is  indefensible,  that  their  only  chance  to  escape 
popular  condemnation  is  to  keep  the  people  in  ignorance;  that 
is  why  they  dissemble,  both  as  to  authority  for  and  the  mean- 
ing of  actual  conditions.  But  they  comprehend  clearly  the 
relation  of  parliamentary  institutions  to  political  plunder; 
therefore  they  permit  nothing  to  disturb  their  parliamentary 
institutions.  As  parliamentary  conditions  have  grown  worse, 
the  deceptions  have  become  deeper  and  more  complicated.  To 
take  any  other  view  is  to  enthrone  chance  and  accident  as  the 
architects  of  a  most  complicated  system,  and  to  assume  that 
the  politicians  have  only  drifted,  hand  in  hand  with  chance. 
Masterful  things  do  not  just  happen;  nor  are  the  politicians 
given  to  a  blind  reliance  upon  undirected  developments.  They 
are  men  making  a  profession  of  politics.  They  study  their 
business  as  you  do  yours. 

The  dividends  of  politics  are  represented  in  office  and  the 
perquisites  of  office.  The  parliamentary  system  of  Congress 
is  both  mint  and  clearing  house  for  this  counterfeit  currency 
of  politics.  Both  of  the  other  basic  elements  in  the  political 
system  also  enter  into  this  consideration  of  insurgency.  These 
are  the  bi-partisan  spoils  combination  and  the  manipulation  of 
public  opinion.  All  three,  (1)  parliamentary  conditions,  (2) 
bi-partisanship,  and  (3)  the  misdirection  of  public  sentiment, 
blend  in  every  manifestation  of  modern  politics. 

It  will  not  be  necessary  to  go  back  farther  than  ten  years, 
nor  to  consider  conditions  outside  the  House  of  Representa- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  56 

tives.  A  decade  ago  there  were  only  whispers  of  protest 
against  the  complete  bossism  of  that  regime.  A  little  later, 
becoming  conspicuous  in  1907  and  culminating  in  1910,  insur- 
gency took  shape  and  assumed  real  influence.  A  most  impor- 
tant point  to  bear  in  mind  is  the  fact  that  this  insurgency  was 
wholly  within  the  dominant  party.  Therein  lies  the  reason  of 
its  failure.  The  opposition  of  the  minority  party  to  dark- 
ened, undemocratic,  unbusinesslike  procedure,  has  in  recent 
years  been  only  a  sham  battle.  And  rules  reform  never  will 
succeed  so  long  as  existing  lines  of  sham  partisanship  are  kept 
intact.  Insurgency  must  become  non-partisan;  to  be  potent 
it  must  include  the  members  of  all  parties  who  stand  for  public 
service  rather  than  the  spoils  of  politics.  It  must  occupy  the 
balance-of-power  position.  1 "* 

We  ought  to  have  a  new  political  vocabulary.  Old  phrases 
have  become  hackneyed  and  nearly  meaningless,  whereas  the 
troubles  lies  in  the  fact  that  we  never  comprehended  the  condi- 
tions they  were  intended  to  express.  For  example,  the  public 
has  been  surfeited  with  such  words  as  "rules  reform."  I  must 
use  them  here.  Their  use  would  not  hinder,  but  aid  interest,  if 
the  people  understood  that  rules  reform  means  simple  honesty 
and  efficiency  where  there  is  now  plunder  and  waste  in  public 
life;  that  it  means  regular,  orderly  procedure  where  now  dis- 
order reaches  almost  to  chaos ;  that  rules  reform  means  only  a 
substitution  of  sunlight  for  the  darkened  processes  of  pro- 
fessional poHticians.  Publicity  and  an  opportunity  to  have  a 
voice  and  vote  by  breaking  down  the  absolute  bossism  of  that 
period  were  the  more  definite  issues  which  caused  the  first 
insurgency  against  Cannonism  to  develop. 

What  the  Cannon  regime  was,  and  what  has  since  developed 
out  of  it,  will  be  detailed  in  the  next  chapter.  It  is  sufficient 
here,  for  the  purposes  of  this  installment,  to  point  out  that 
Cannonisfn  was  the  parliamentary  system  of  that  period.  In 
every  interpretation  of  politics  we  come  to  that  basic  fact. 


\l* 


56  YOUR  CONGRESS 

the  coursing  of  all  political  streams  through  parliamentary 
conditions. 

In  1905-7  affairs  in  the  House  of  Representatives  were 
running  smoothly,  with  Cannonism  in  full  swing.  The  Repub- 
licans were  then  in  overwhelming  control,  and  practically  all 
were  "regular."  Only  distant  mutterings  of  the  insurgent 
storm  had  been  heard.  The  Democrats,  a  helpless  minority  of 
136,  were  then  arrayed  solidly  against  the  majority  on  ques- 
tions of  procedure.  They  stood  for  ''rules  reform."  That  is 
always  the  way:  the  minority,  when  their  protests  cannot 
count,  invariably  favor  light  and  order  and  democracy  in  the 
proceedings.  The  majority,  in  whom  power  and  responsi- 
bility lie,  are  as  unvaryingly  for  the  darkened  parliamentary 
system.  The  outs  are  virtuous,  while  the  ins  are  vicious. 
Viciousness  and  virtue  have  seemed  to  depend  entirely  on 
who  were  in  and  who  were  out.  In  other  words,  the  majority 
is  always  reactionary  and  the  minority  always  progressive  on 
all-important  questions  of  procedure,  it  matters  not  in  the  least 
which  political  group  happens  to  be  in  authority. 

The  parliamentary  situation  ten  years  ago  in  its  partisan 
aspects  may  be  diagramed  as  follows : 

FtFry-MNTH  CONGRESS  -I90S'7        336     MEMBERS 


SaagOBsHiia 


Democrats 

T36 


P&r/cened  sp3oa  represents  reactionary  White  space  indicat- 
aiii iude  on.  rule s  reform .  es  reform  dtliiudQ 

In  the  Sixtieth  Congress,  while  the  sham  battle  conditions 
still  remained  nearly  ideal  for  the  professional  politicians, 
there  began  to  develop  signs  of  what  was  to  follow.  The 
Democrats  gained  twenty-eight  in  number,  and  the  inter- 
Republican  revolt  against  boss  control  became  perceptible. 
Cannonism  became  an  issue.  The  dissenters  within  the 
Cannon  party  made  it  an  issue.     Bear  that  in  mind.     And 


YOUR  CONGRESS 


57 


another  important  point  to  remember  is  the  fact  that  these 
few  pioneer  majority  party  insurgents  quickly  took  from  the 
Democrats  the  center  of  the  stage  in  the  fight  against  Repub- 
lican parliamentary  practices.  This  was  because  their  oppo- 
sition was  real,  while  the  Democrats  as  a  party  had  been  main- 
taining only  the  usual  blank-cartridge  attitude  of  the  outs 
against  the  ins. 

At  this  stage  the  situation  was  as  follows: 


SIXTIETH  CONOR  ESS -1907 'OS 


^SOME^MBERS 


Democrats -164 

^^^^  KfiDu  h  M  r  ;^  n  <:s 

-  zzz^^m 

HiK.mUi 

Dark-rea.clion3ri^  o-n.rzjLl<Bs>  refor-nz,  "While. -prog ressi ire  in. 

proce.cLicr-e.. 

The  next  Congress,  the  Sixty-first,  witnessed  the  culmina- 
tion of  insurgency.  The  Republican  dissenters  grew  in  numbers 
to  a  point  where  their  votes,  added  to  those  of  the  Democratic 
minority,  were  sufiicient  to  overthrow  the  Cannon  Republicans. 
Then  the  inevitable  happened.  The  unmasking  began.  The 
common  danger  impelled  the  politicians  of  both  parties  to 
cease  their  sham  battles.  A  number  of  Democrats  adequate 
to  save  Cannon  joined  with  the  Republican  regulars  when  the 
crisis  came.  That  marked  the  birth  of  the  bi-partisan  combi- 
nation which  in  every  Congress  since  has  grown  in  amity  and 
effectiveness. 

This  most  instructive  period  may  be  diagramed  as  follows: 


SlXTY-F//^ST  COAfGfZBSS  -iBOB^IL 


386  MEMBBRS 


S^ggj^^rtfefekki 


\>er(\ocr^t^ 


tsur^errts 


Gsrk.- reset 


xongry 


Whiiff-  progress/ */e 

In  an  appendix  to  this  chapter  there  is  given  a  table  of 
roll  calls,  from  which  it  can  be  ascertained  just  how  the  mem- 


58  YOUR  CONGRESS 

bers  voted  on  several  vital  parliamentary  matters  in  the  Sixty- 
first  Congress.  The  unmasking  crisis  came  on  March  15,  1909. 
The  insurgent-Democratic  alliance  had  been  sufficiently  strong 
to  prevent  the  adoption  of  the  old  rules.  Champ  Clark,  leader 
of  the  Democrats,  then  proposed  an  amendment  to  the  rules, 
deposing  Cannon  from  the  Rules  Committee  and  providing 
that  that  committee  should  be  elected  by  the  House.  John  J. 
Fitzgerald,  of  New  York,  moved  the  adoption  of  a  substitute, 
making  a  few  minor  changes  in  the  rules,  but  leaving  Cannon's 
power  over  the  Rules  Committee — the  crucial  point — as  it  had 
been.  The  Fitzgerald  amendment  was  adopted  March  15, 
1909,  by  a  vote  of  211  to  173,  with  five  not  voting.^*  On  this 
occasion  the  Republican  regulars  were  reinforced  by  a  number 
of  Democrats  led  by  Mr.  Fitzgerald.  This  was  the  first 
evidence  of  the  bi-partisan  organization  which  has  since  be- 
come so  pronounced  whenever  it  is  necessary  to  drop  the  mask 
of  partyism. 

The  next  development  shows  a  complete  reversal  of  party 
attitude  in  reference  to  the  parliamentary  system.  The  Demo- 
crats gained  control  of  the  House  and  became  the  responsible 
reactionaries  on  rules  reform.  They  did  not  improve  condi- 
tions; on  the  contrary,  the  parliamentary  system  became  more 
undemocratic  and  darker  than  it  had  ever  been.  During  this 
period,  as  in  the  following  Congress — the  Sixty-third — the 
Democratic  majority  employed  the  same  parliamentary  tactics 


1*  It  is  of  interest  to  note  who  were  the  irregulars  of  both  parties  on  this  crucial  occasion. 
The  following  Republicans  voted  against  Cannon:  William  J.  Gary  of  Wisconsin,  Henry  A. 
Cooper  of  Wisconsin,  James  H.  Davidson  of  Wisconsin,  Charles  R.  Davis  of  Minnesota, 
Augustus  P.  Gardner  of  Massachusetts,  Asle  J.  Gronna  of  North  Dakota,  Gilbert  N.  Haugen 
of  Iowa,  Everis  A.,  Hayes  of  California,  Edmund  H.  Hinshaw  of  Nebraska,  Elbert  H. 
Hubbard  of  Iowa,  Nathan  E.  Kendall  of  Iowa,  Moses  P.  Kinkaid  of  Nebraska,  Arthur  W. 
Kopp  of  Wisconsin,  Gustav  Kusterman  of  Wisconsin,  Irvine  L.  Lenroot  of  Wisconsin, 
Charles  A.  Lindbergh  of  Minnesota,  WiUiam  C.  Lovering  of  Massachusetts,  Edmond  H. 
Madison  of  Kansas,  Elmer  A.  Morse  of  Wisconsin,  Victor  Murdock  of  Kansas,  John  M. 
Nelson  of  Wisconsin,  George  W.  Norris  of  Nebraska,  Ch£u-les  E.  Pickett  of  Iowa,  Miles 
Poindexter  of  Washington,  Andrew  J.  Volstead  of  Minnesota,  Frank  P.  Woods  of  Iowa. 

The  Democrats  who  came  to  Cannon's  rescue  were  as  follows:  George  A.  Bartlett  of 
Nevada,  William  G.  Brantley  of  Georgia,  Robert  F.  Broussard  of  Louisiana,  Michael  F. 
Conry  of  New  York,  Charles  G.  Edwards  of  Georgia,  Albert  Estopinal  of  Louisiana, 
John  J.  Fitzgerald  of  New  York,  Charles  V.  Fornes  of  New  York,  Henry  M.  Goldfogle  of 
New  York,  Joseph  A.  Goulden  of  New  York,  Francis  B.  Harrison  of  New  York,  William  M. 
Howard  of  Georgia,  John  A.  Keliher  of  Massachusetts,  Gordon  Lee  of  Georgia.  George  H. 
Lindsay  of  New  York,  L.  F.  Livingston  of  Georgia,  James  T.  McDermott  of  Illinois,  John 
A.  Moon  of  Tennessee,  Joseph  F.  O'Connell  of  Massachusetts,  Andrew  J,  Peters  of  Massa- 
chusetts, Daniel  J.  Riordan  of  New  York,  Stephen  M.  Sparkman  of  Florida. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  59 

that  the  Cannon  Republicans  had  used;  but  their  method  of 
organization  was  much  more  complicated  and  irresponsible, 
and  the  closed  caucus  was  raised  to  an  evil  importance  never 
approached  by  any  previous  regime. 
A  diagram  would  reveal  this  situation: 

5/X  TY-5ECOND  COr^GRESS  -  f9//-/3  386  A1£/^B£/?S 


Wh  i  ie.  -  progre.  ss  i  lye.  Del  rjc  -  r&aal  ion.  e.  rzj 

S  H^d&cZ.  -pari  ly  prog  ressivre. 

It  was  logical,  perhaps  inevitable,  that  the  Democrats  should 
thus  completely  change  their  character  on  rules  reform.  The 
transition  from  impotent  minority  to  responsible  majority 
always  means  a  reversal  of  attitude  in  parliamentary  matters. 
The  parHamentary  system  has  to  be  preserved,  and  the  ma- 
jority must  invariably  face  the  stigma  of  upholding  it.  The 
politicians  know  that  in  two  or  three  Congresses  the  failure  to 
improve  parliamentary  conditions,  more  than  all  other  influ- 
ences, will  swing  the  pendulum  of  control  back  to  the  other 
party.  They  expect  that.  They  expect  also,  when  they  become 
a  minority  again,  to  change  their  spots,  to  make  a  new  reputa- 
tion as  parliamentary  reformers,  which  will  return  them  to 
another  period  of  power.  So  the  political  teeter  board,  bal- 
anced on  the  back  of  the  people,  works — now  up,  now  down. 

It  is  quite  as  natural  for  the  minority,  relieved  of  responsi- 
bility for  vicious,  unpopular  conditions,  suddenly  to  become 
progressive.  The  minority  has  nothing  to  do  but  play  politics, 
to  make  amends  for  past  misconduct,  in  anticipation  of  the 
day  of  their  return  to  authority.  It  is  natural  for  the  minority 
to  become  united  and  harmonious  in  that  role.  There  is  noth- 
ing at  sfake.  The  time  has  come  for  all  of  the  minority  to 
protest  against  dark-lantern  methods  in  legislation. 

Therefore,  in  the  Sixty-second  Congress,  we  find  the  old 


60  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Cannon  regulars  in  the  role  of  progressives,  denouncing  the 
very  **gag  rules"  they  had  modeled  a  few  years  before.  They 
talked  as  loudly  and  as  long  in  favor  of  reform  as  the  anti- 
Cannon  group  had  done.  The  tendency,  then,  was  for  the 
original  Republican  insurgents  to  lose  their  identity  and  pro- 
gressive character  in  the  general  minority  blending  of  the 
fictitious  with  the  real.  But  that  did  not  come  completely 
until  the  next  Congress.  On  questions  of  procedure,  the 
original  revolters  could  not  vote  more  progressively  than  the 
old  regulars  did.  The  only  opportunity  to  manifest  the  dis- 
tinction that  still  existed  came  when  that  Congress  was  organ- 
ized; and  they  here  refused  to  join  with  the  regulars  in  organ- 
izing the  minority.  When  James  R.  Mann,  a  former  Cannon 
lieutenant,  was  presented  as  the  regular  Republican  candidate 
for  Speaker,  which  meant  the  leadership  of  the  minority,  they 
refused  to  support  him.^'^ 

In  view  of  the  past  irreconcilable  differences  between  Can- 
non and  anti-Cannon  Republicans,  this  situation  was  not  in  the 
least  illogical.  The  more  inexplicable  development  came  in 
the  next  Congress,  when  the  breach  was  healed.  The  unusual 
feature  at  this  time — the  Sixty-second  Congress — was  the  fact 
that  the  minority  was  lacking  in  unity,  while  the  majority, 
where  insurgency  usually  manifests  itself,  was  a  harmonious 
whole. 

The  next  development  may  be  diagramed  as  follows: 

SIXTY-THIRD  CONGRESS-lSn-iS  ^35ME/nBERS 


Shaded-parUy  Pjrk-  rcaalioTzai-jy  on  rules 

projgressive. 

W/i  He.  'prog  re^s  i  «/«2. 


»0n  April  4,  1911,  the  following  Progressive  Republicans  voted  against  Mr.  Mann's 
leadership  of  their  party: 

Akin,  Anderson,  Cooper,  Davidson,  Davis,  French,  Jackson,  Kent,  Kopp,  Lafferty, 
LaFoUette,  Lenroot,  Lindbergh,  Morse,  Murdock,  Nelson.  Warburton. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  61 

The  organization  of  this  last  Congress  presented  a  crisis  for 
the  politicians.  Their  system  hung  by  a  thread.  But  the  day 
was  saved,  and  the  insurgents  lost  the  best  chance  in  a  decade 
to  break  the  power  of  the  bi-partisan  combination,  to  expose 
and  diminish  their  hold  upon  the  parliamentary  system.  The 
''leaders"  proved  equal  to  the  emergency :  they  were  able  to 
prevent  the  formation  of  the  non-partisan,  anti-spoils,  balance 
of  power  group  which  threatened  their  system. 

Three  elements,  working  together  partly  through  chance, 
contrived  to  turn  victory  into  defeat  for  the  public.  These 
were: 

1.  The  return  of  the  anti-Cannon  group  to  the  camp  of  the 
Republican  regulars; 

2.  The  untimely  introduction  of  a  new  partisan  influence  in 
the  Progressive  party  group;  and,  more  inexplicable  than  the 
others ; 

3.  The  fact  that  the  Democratic  majority  reached  its  crest 
of  strength  and  power  without  insurgency. 

All  this  meant  partyism,  the  safeguard  of  the  politicians. 
Just  at  the  most  critical  time,  the  independents  were  divided 
and  subdivided  into  antagonistic  groups.  It  meant  not  only 
that  the  insurgents  were  kept  apart,  but  that  they  were  set  to 
fighting  in  every  crisis,  progressive  against  progressive.  It 
meant  that  each  party  should  segregate  and  submerge  and  con- 
trol its  own  progressives. 

The  test  came  with  the  election  of  Speaker.  The  Democrats 
voted  unanimously  for  Champ  Clark.  That  was  the  work  of 
the  majority  party  caucus.  It  meant  that  the  Democratic  pro- 
gressives were  a  part  of  the  secret  caucus  system  of  that  party 
and  rendered  powerless  through  meek  submission  to  the  straw- 
strength  of  that  vicious  instrumentality.  Their  battles  were 
fought  within  the  caucus.  The  practice  of  the  caucus  has  been, 
and  will  be  until  revolt  and  revolution  come,  to  "bind'*  every 
member  to  vote  in  the  House  as  a  majority  may  decide  in  the 
caucus.  (What  the  caucus  is  and  does  will  be  explained 
later.)     The  Democratic  caucus  was  about  two-thirds  reac- 


62  YOUR  CONGRESS 

tionary;  the  reactionaries  controlled  the  progressives.  That 
took  care  of  the  problem  of  the  Democratic  progressives. 
There  was  no  contest  on  the  Speakership,  and  on  the  vital 
issue  of  organization  and  the  rules  all  stood  together.  Except 
for  a  few  individuals,  it  was  impossible  to  distinguish  between 
progressives  and  reactionaries  on  the  Democratic  side. 

The  vote  for  Mr.  Mann  meant  that  the  House  Republicans 
had  at  last  been  ''harmonized;"  that  distinctions  between  pro- 
gressives and  reactionaries  had  been  largely  swept  away ;  that, 
for  the  first  time  since  the  beginning  of  the  fight  against  Can- 
nonism,  the  Republicans  presented  an  almost  unbroken  front; 
that  a  reawakened  spirit  of  partisanship  had  bridged  party 
differences  and  difficulties  which  one  short  year  before  seemed 
absolutely  unbridgeable. 

The  vote  for  Mr.  Murdock,  the  Progressive  party  candidate 
for  Speaker,  in  a  fundamental  sense  emphasized  a  new  subdi- 
vision of  progressives,  another  and  fiercely  jealous  partisan- 
ship. It  was  a  most  inopportune  time  for  the  birth  of  a  new 
party  ism  in  Congress. 

The  session  had  hardly  begun  before  there  came  a  typical 
illustration  of  the  results  of  this  new  allignment.  A  number  of 
vital  and  necessary  reforms  in  the  rules  were  proposed.  Be- 
cause these  amendments  came  from  a  Bull  Mooser,  both 
Republican  progressives  and  Democratic  progressives  joined 
with  Republican  reactionaries  and  Democratic  reactionaries  in 
a  refusal  to  accept  them,  although  if  the  question  of  party 
advantage  could  have  been  eliminated  every  real  progressive 
would  have  supported  the  proposed  changes.  As  it  was,  only 
twenty-five  voted  affirmatively — not  a  sufficient  number  to 
secure  a  roll  call.    That  happened  repeatedly. 

Think  how  differently  the  situation  might  have  been. 
There  were  probably  fifty  incipient  insurgents  among  the 
Democrats — members  disgusted  with  the  caucus  and  pelf  and 
plunder  methods  of  their  own  party  organization — who  were 
almost  ready  to  bolt.  There  were  about  twenty-five  progres- 
sive Republicans,  new  and  old,  who  surrendered  to  the  har- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  63 

mony  movement  within  their  own  party.  There  were  eighteen 
Progressives  who  supported  the  Bull  Moose  candidate  for 
Speaker.^^  Add  to  these  Gary,  Gooper,  Mapes,  Norton  and 
Young,  of  North  Dakota,  Republicans  who  protested  against 
organizing  their  party  under  Mann's  leadership.  All  these 
hundred  members  belonged  together.  They  believed  in  the 
same  parliamentary  changes,  so  far  as  fundamentals  were 
concerned.  Had  they  stood  together,  as  they  would  have  done 
had  the  artificial  influence  of  partyism  not  made  them  political 
enemies,  the  whole  history  of  the  last  Gongress  would  have 
been  very  different. 

If  the  original  Republican  insurgents  had  gone  through  just 
this  one  more  crisis,  maintaining  their  independence;  if  the 
Bull  Moosers  had  not  played  so  openly  for  party  advantage; 
if  revolt  within  the  Democratic  ranks  could  have  been  encour- 
aged, rather  than  prevented,  by  the  example  of  these  progres- 
sives who  had  a  right  to  be  called  the  pioneers,  it  would  have 
been  possible,  easy  even,  to  have  banded  together  on  the  high 
patriotic  plane  of  non-partisanship,  a  force  strong  enough  to 
compell  a  roll  call  on  every  important  question.  Public  senti- 
ment would  have  accomplished  the  rest.  A  balance  of  power^ 
in  the  people's  interest  would  have  been  achieved. 

It  was  the  time  of  all  times  for  the  original  anti-Gannon 
group,  dwindled  though  they  were,  to  stand  firm.  One  more 
fight  would  have  won.  They  were  logically  the  leaders,  if  a 
non-partisan,  anti-spoils,  balance-of-power  movement  was  to 
be  launched.  The  Bull  Moose  members  could  hardly  have 
refused  cooperation.  The  many  wavering  Democrats  needed 
only  that  little  encouragement  to  break  with  their  organiza- 
tion. But  the  original  anti-Gannon  insurgents,  instead  of 
rising  to  the  occasion,  surrendered,  and  the  opportunity  was 
gone. 

Another  point  should  be  noted  here.  The  system  in  Gon- 
gress— and  by  that  I  mean  the  methods  by  which  a  few  poli- 

"  A  few  did  not  reach  Washington  in  time  to  vote  on  the  Speakership.  Possibly 
others  of  them  would  have  taken  the  independent  position. 


64  YOUR  CONGRESS 

ticians  control  the  membership  and  activities  of  every  session — 
is  always  aided  by  the  complete  exclusion,  during  the  critical 
organization  period,  of  the  new  member  element.  More  than 
150  Congressmen  entered  the  House  for  the  first  time  April 
7,  1913.  These  new  members  came  fresh  from  the  people, 
bearing  a  direct  commission  to  do  certain  things,  to  represent 
their  constituents  along  certain  lines.  Yet  not  one  of  them  was 
given  even  the  smallest  chance  to  work  for  a  change  in  the 
conditions  that  made  the  last  Congress  the  plaything  of  a  few 
past-master  politicians.  The  organization  was  maneuvered  to 
the  minutest  detail  by  the  old  members,  which  is  done  every 
biennium.  Being  ignorant  of  the  game,  not  knowing  either 
their  power  or  their  opportunity,  all  that  the  new  members 
did,  with  only  a  few  exceptions,  was  to  merge  into  their  respec- 
tive party  herds.  Then  it  was  too  late  to  get  out  of  the  party 
pasture,  or  to  do  any  good  if  it  had  been  possible  to  scale  the 
15-foot  fence  of  partisanship.  The  progressive  strength  had 
been  hopelessly  divided  and  subdivided ;  the  old  rules  had  been 
adopted;  the  opportunity  to  fight  effectively  was  gone. 

What  will  be  the  situation  in  the  Sixty-fourth  Congress? 
We  know  only  the  party  divisions,  and  the  general  trend  of 
parliamentary  developments,  all  of  which  is  unpromising.  But 
a  new  element,  a  constructive  program  of  rules  reform,  is  to 
be  projected  into  the  balance.  This  will  be  entirely  new,  and 
no  one  can  estimate  its  influence.  Five  years  ago  it  would  have 
been  sufficient  to  alter  conditions;  now  conditions  are  much 
more  favorable  to  the  enemies  of  change. 

Party  divisions  in  the  next  Congress  will  be  proportionally 
as  follows: 


SIXTY-FOURTH  CO^CR^SS  -/9/S-/7.                                     ^3S  ME/HlBE/eS 

Bapu.b)i*cans  - 1 93 

Democ-rats-  2.33 

jPrqgressives 

YOUR  CONGRESS  65 

These  figures  tend  to  indicate  that  in  the  following  Con- 
gress— the  Sixty-fifth — the  Republicans  will  return  to  power. 
Then  the  circle  will  have  been  completed — with  worse  than 
nothing  accomplished  in  the  all-important  parliamentary  field. 
At  this  point  it  is  perfectly  clear — 

That  partyism,  in  a,  sham  sense,  is  more  pronounced  than 
ever  before; 

That  insurgency  is  at  its  lowest  ebb  since  ipo/; 

That  the  Democrats  as  a  party  have  passed  the  crest,  and 
are  declining  in  strength,  without  insurgency; 

That  the  Republicans,  now  gaining  and  apparently  soon  to 
reclaim  control  of  the  House,  are  almost  completely  harmo- 
nized, with  insurgency  stamped  out;  and 

That  the  Bull  Moosers,  after  contributing  an  influence 
toward  partyism  at  an  inopportune  time,  have  dwindled  from 
little  to  less,  with  their  ablest  leaders  defeated  in  the  last 
election. 

And  just  when  insurgency,  which  in  its  final  analysis  means 
rules  reform,  is  at  its  lowest  ebb,  with  the  bi-partisan  combi- 
nation in  the  most  advantageous  position  to  keep  this  influence 
from  developing,  parliamentary  conditions  have  never  been  so 
dark  and  undemocratic  as  now — so  much  in  need  of  whole- 
some change. 


1 


GETTING  AT  THE  TRUTH  OF  IT 

In  1911  the  politicians  boldly  trumpeted  to  the  country  the  claim 
that  the  rules  of  the  House  had  been  reformed.  The  people,  perhaps 
a  majority  of  them,  having  no  means  of  ascertaining  the  truth  or 
falsity  of  this  political  assertion,  took  the  politicians  at  their  word. 
That  is  where  the  perversion  of  public  opinion  entered  into  it.  I 
know  of  only  one  other  manipulation  of  public  sentiment  on  a 
national  scale  that  was  bigger  or  more  successful.  The  best  proof 
of  this  will  be  found  in  the  analysis  of  what  followed  Cannonism 
which  is  given  in  the  next  chapter. 

There  are  two  reasons  for  the  following  installment:  (!)  to 
correct,  as  much  as  it  can  be  done  at  this  late  date,  the  erroneous 
idea  of  parliamentary  conditions  which  the  self-interested  politicians 
have  planted  in  the  public  mind;  and  (^)  to  make  that  detailed 
diagnosis  of  the  unhealthy  system  which  must  precede  the  prescrip- 
tion of  remedies.  Reconstruction  is  the  big  object.  I  would  not 
have  traced  the  ebb  and  flow  of  insurgency,  nor  would  I  stop  next 
to  study  existing  parliamentary  abuses,  if  both  were  not  necessary 
antecedents  of  the  chapter  on  constructive  remedies. 

And  do  not  forget  that  Just  as  politics  is  at  present  the  only 
instrumentality  for  the  fulfillment,  or  abortion,  of  the  objects  of 
government,  so  is  insurgency,  which  means  independence  and 
opposition  to  spoils,  the  only  agency  through  which  can  come  a 
purifying  of  politics  at  its  most  unwholesome  spot — the  parlia- 
mentary system  of  congress. 


66 


?> 


CHAPTER  IV 
LEGISLATING  WITH  A  DARK  LANTERN 


My  study  of  Congress  has  been  marked  by  a  series  of  simple 
discoveries.  First  came  the  revelation  that  public  position,  with 
its  prestige  and  perquisites,  rather  than  public  service,  was  the 
aim  and  end  of  political  organization.  Then,  in  searching  for 
the  chief  instrumentalities  of  this  end-in-itself  political  system, 
I  found  them  all  to  center  in  the  parliamentary  institutions  of 
Congress.  Next  I  discovered  that  the  utter  failure  of  insur- 
gency even  to  maintain  itself,  to  say  nothing  of  accomplishing 
rules  reform,  was  due  largely  to  the  fact  that  it  never  had  big 
reconstructive  objects.  Following  that  I  discovered  that  Can- 
nonism  was  not  a  thing  of  the  past,  that  parliamentary  condi- 
tions were  darker,  more  devious  and  undemocratic  now  than 
ever  before  in  the  whole  history  of  Congress. 

The  Democrats,  when  they  assumed  control  of  the  House 
of  Representatives  in  1911,  did  not  abolish  Cannonism;  they 
disguised  it  by  combining  with  that  system  the  discredited 
machine  methods  that  Aldrich  had  used  in  the  Senate.  The 
only  essential  difference  between  the  old  Cannon  regime  and 
the  House  machine  that  grew  out  of  it  exists  in  a  cleverly 
masked  transfer  of  power  from  Speaker  to  floor  leader. 

In  modern  times  Congress  has  known  but  two  systems  of 
parliamentary  procedure.  One,  based  upon  extraordinary 
powers  vested  in  the  presiding  officer,  reached  its  highest 
development  under  Cannon  in  the  House.  The  other,  based 
upon  authority  in  the  hands  of  the  floor  leader,  was  developed 
by  Aldrich  in  the  Senate.  What  the  Democrats  did  in  1911, 
without  disturbing  the  foundations  of  either,  was  to  combine 
Cannonism  and  Aldrichism.  The  Democrats  did  not  make  a 
single  contribution  to  this  supposedly  new  regime.  They 
adapted  and  blended  together  the  worst  elements  of  two  bad 
systems,  both  Republican  in  origin. 

67 


68  YOUR  CONGRESS 

It  is  interesting  further  to  note  that  the  Democrats  have  rec- 
ognized and  depended  upon  regular  Republicans  to  such  an 
extent  that  the  new  system  has  been  distinctly  bi-partisan. 
Under  Cannon,  except  during  the  crisis  of  insurgency  in  1910, 
the  Republicans  were  partisan  in  parliamentary  matters.  The 
Democratic  leaders,  on  the  contrary,  have  worked  hand  in 
hand  with  their  political  "enemies."  Using  Republican  ma- 
chinery, perhaps  they  deemed  it  necessary  to  employ  machin- 
ists of  that  school.  At  first  the  usual  sham  battles  might 
deceive  you  on  this  important  point,  but  a  close  inspection  of 
the  machine  at  work  would  remove  all  doubt. 

The  best  way  to  study  the  parliamentary  system  is  along 
practical  lines.  It  is  not  a  theoretical  thing.  Legislation  is 
accomplished  or  defeated  through  the  direct  operation  of  par- 
liamentary institutions.  It  is  not  a  question  of  votes,  but  of 
manipulations.  Those  few  in  control  of  parliamentary  devices 
have  their  powers  multiplied  manyfold.  The  members  on  the 
outside,  regardless  of  ability  or  inclination,  are  as  helpless 
against  the  "leaders"  as  unarmed  men  would  be  facing  instru- 
ments of  death. 

First,  the  individual  member  introduces  a  bill.  It  goes  auto- 
matically to  the  standing  committee  having  jurisdiction.  Ordi- 
narily that  ends  its  history.  If  there  is  a  report  from  its  com- 
mittee, the  bill  next  is  considered  in  the  darkened  committee 
of  the  whole.  Then  the  open  House  has  a  chance,  just  suffi- 
cient to  maintain  a  pretense  of  deliberation.  After  that,  almost 
without  exception,  measures  of  general  interest  pass  finally 
into  the  hands  of  a  conference  committee,  an  inevitable  evil  in 
a  bi-cameral  congress. 

The  situation  would  be  simple  if  we  had  only  to  deal  with 
the  routine  above  suggested,  but  three  big  influences  touch 
legislation  at  every  point. 

These  are: 

1.  The  someivhat  vague,  hut  always  all-powerful  element 
which  we  may  call  the  "organization;" 


YOUR  CONGRESS  69 

2,  The  closed  caucus,  a  wholly  unofficial  institution,  which  is 
at  once  creator  and  creature  of  the  organization;  and 

3.  The  Committee  on  Rules,  a  subsidiary  body  over  ivhich 
the  House  itself  has  no  authority,  zuhich  is  the  politicians' 
steering  committee  and  can  step  in  at  any  point  to  control  the 
fate  of  almost  all  legislation. 

These  special  instrumentalities  should  be  studied  in  advance 
of  a  general  inspection  of  events  in  the  order  of  their  occur- 
rence. They  show  how  the  House  is  organized  and  controlled, 
and  illuminate  every  step  in  the  proceedings. 

Organizing  the  House — Then  and  Now 

Cannonism  was  the  parliamentary  system  of  that  period. 
Back  in  those  dark  parliamentary  days  the  insurgents  fought 
chiefly  for  two  changes,  both  aimed,  not  at  the  system  but  at 
the  individual  head  of  the  system.    These  were : 

1.  To  take  away  from  the  Speaker  the  appointment  of  com- 
mittees; and 

2.  To  give  to  a  majority  of  the  House  control  over  its  stand- 
ing committees. 

The  crux  of  Cannonism  was  the  Speaker's  power  to  appoint^ 
committees.  But  there  was  coupled  with  the  one-man  naming 
of  committees  a  complete  lack  of  control  over  these  committees 
by  the  Hou§e  itself.  Otherwise  the  machine  thus  assembled 
could  not  have  been  manipulated  at  will  by  the  organizer. 
When  the  Speaker,  in  the  exercise  of  his  arbitrary  privilege 
as  the  organizer  of  the  House,  had  packed  the  crucial  com- 
mittees, these  committees  were  supreme.  The  rules  gave  to 
the  House  no  adequate  authority  over  its  subordinate  bodies. 

Another  basic  element  in  the  Cannon  system  was  the 
Speaker's  position  at  the  head  of  the  Committee  on  Rules, 
from  which' vantage  ground  he  could  dictate  the  regular  and 


70  YOUR  CONGRESS 

special  rules  under  which  the  House  was  operated  by  a  small 
oligarchy  of  leaders. 

In  that  period,  then,  the  power  to  appoint  committees, 
coupled  with  the  impotency  of  the  majority  in  reference  to 
committees  and  rules,  was  the  power  to  control  the  politics, 
perquisites  and  legislation  of  the  House.  What  is  the  situation 
in  these  respects  today  ? 

During  the  regimes  of  Cannon  in  the  House  and  Aldrich  in 
the  Senate,  the  appointive  power  was  virtually  in  the  hands  of 
one  man.  Cannon  was  direct  and  absolute  in  his  authority  to 
build  an  organization  through  control  of  the  personnel  of 
committees.  Aldrich  arrived  at  the  same  result  in  a  more 
irresponsible  way,  through  a  ''committee  on  committees," 
which  he  dominated. 

In  the  last  Congress  the  bi-partisan  organization  was  effected 
through  a  combination  of  Aldrich  and  Cannon  methods.  The 
Democratic  members  of  committees,  including  the  fifty-eight 
chairmanships,  were  given  their  places,  a  la  Aldrich,  by  the 
Democratic  members  of  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee,  of 
which  Oscar  W.  Underwood  was  chairman.  As  the  leader  of 
his  side  of  the  liouse,  Underwood  did  as  Aldrich  formerly 
did  in  the  Senate.  The  Republican  minority  members  were 
apportioned  by  one  man  as  they  were  during  the  Cannon  days. 
The  Republican  organizer  was  James  R.  Mann. 

These  two — Oscar  W.  Underwood,  Democrat,  and  James  R. 
Mann,  Republican — were  the  all-powerful  figures  in  the 
House.  They  did  not  often  openly  cooperate  in  legislation, 
but  their  organizations  usually  worked  together  to  prevent 
fundamental  changes  in  the  rules,  to  protect  the  personal  and 
political  interests  of  members  of  both  parties,  and  to  keep  the 
present  undemocratic  parliamentary  system  intact. 

The  Democratic  caucus  resolution  which  gave  to  Mr.  Under- 
wood, whom  the  caucus  had  already  chosen  chairman  of  the 
Ways  and  Means  Committee,  his  opportunity  and  power  in 
the  selection  of  committees  should  be  presented  here.     The 


YOUR  CONGRESS  71 

first   paragraph  contains  a  fine  touch   of   humor.     It  is   as 
follows : 

Resolved,  That  the  rules  of  the  House  in  the  Sixty-third  Congress 
shall  prescribe  that  the  standing  committees  of  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives shall  be  elected  by  the  House. 

Resolved  further,  That  the  majority  members  of  the  Ways  and 
Means  Committee  elected  by  the  caucus  to  serve  as  such  during  the 
Sixty-third  Congress  be  and  they  are  hereby  authorized  to  nominate 
the  majority  members  of  the  standing  committees  of  the  House  in 
the  Sixty-Third  Congress  to  the  caucus  for  its  ratification  or  rejection, 
and  that  the  majority  members  of  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee  of 
the  House  in  the  Sixty-third  Congress  shall  not  be  eligible  to  serve  on 
any  other  standing  committee  of  the  House. 

_  Resolved  further,  That  all  vacancies  occurring  on  any  standing  com- 
mittee shall  be  filled  in  the  same  manner. 

When  this  crucial  matter  was  before  the  majority  party 
caucus,  on  March  5,  1913,  an  unsuccessful  attempt  was  made 
to  change  the  system  from  the  Aldrich  method  to  one  more 
democratic.  WiUiam  H.  Murray,  of  Oklahoma,  offered  the 
following  substitute,  but  Mr.  Underwood's  supporters  con- 
trolled the  caucus  and  it  was  voted  down : 

Be  it  Resolved  by  the  Democratic  House  Caucus,  That  the  rule  of 
this  caucus  providing  that  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means  shall 
select  and  recommend  to  the  caucus  the  members  of  the  various  stand- 
ing committees  of  the  House  of  Representatives  is  hereby  abolished; 
and  that  for  the  future  guidance  in  the  selection  of  the  committees  the 
States  shall  be  grouped  into  seven  several  zones  of  an  equal  number 
of  Democratic  House  members,  and  that  three  members  from  each 
zone  shall  be  selected  by  the  membership  of  each  several  zone  who 
shall  constitute  a  committee  on  committees  to  consist  of  twenty-one 
members,  and  the  Speaker  shall  be  chairman  thereof,  and  that  said 
committee  thus  formed  shall  select  the  majority  members  of  the 
various  House  standing  committees  and  recommend  same  to  this 
caucus  for  the  approval  of  this  caucus  and  that  the  members  for  the 
various  committees  thus  selected  and  approved  by  this  caucus  shall 
constitute  the  majority  members  for  the  several  House  committees. 

The  Murray  resolution,  while  moderating  somewhat  the 
Underwood-Aldrich  method,  would  not  have  remedied  mat- 
ters. It  also  recognized  the  "committee  on  committees"  idea 
and  operated  through  the  unofficial,  closed  caucus,  neither  of 
which  influence  could  be  expected  to  contribute  to  democratic 
character  in  the  organization. 


72  YOUR  CONGRESS 

The  Underwood  resolution,  being  adopted,  meant  a  method 
of  majority  party  organization  two  steps  removed  from  re- 
sponsibility, and  as  great  a  distance  from  deliberate  democracy 
in  that  proceeding.  The  caucus  had  given  Mr.  Underwood's 
"committee  on  committees"  the  authority  to  name  the  standing 
committees.  Then  the  caucus  ^'approved"  these  nominations. 
A  further  fiction  of  the  rule  existed  in  that  portion  of  it 
which  seemed  to  imply  that  the  House  should  "elect"  its  own 
committees;  the  House  also  approved,  as  a  matter  of  course. 
In  the  history  of  the  last  two  Congresses  neither  the  caucus 
nor  the  House  once  interfered  with  the  machine  building  of 
the  committee  on  committees.  It  would  have  been  utterly 
futile  to  attempt  to  interfere  after  the  committee  on  commit- 
tees had  been  launched  by  the  "leaders"  and  sanctioned  by  the 
caucus.  That  signified  that  the  trading  and  dickering  for  place 
and  pelf  had  already  been  done,  that  the  machine  was  in 
motion.  The  "organization,"  which  in  turn  dominated  the 
closed  caucus  and  controlled  the  House,  was  settled  by  a  few 
in  advance  of  both  caucus  and  House. 

Mr.  Mann,  as  the  organizer  of  the  Republican  members,  was 
not  even  nominally  handicapped  by  having  to  work  through  "a 
committee  on  committees."  His  authority  and  power  were 
directly  exercised.    He  used  the  Cannon  one-man  method. 

The  original  Democratic  caucus  resolution  bearing  on  this 
point  was  as  follows : 

Resolved,  That  the  Democratic  members  of  the  Ways  and  Means 
Committee,  through  their  designated  representative  (Underwood), 
shall  arrange  the  assignment  of  the  minority  members  on  the  standing 
committees  of  the  House,  with  the  person  (Mann)  or  persons  author- 
ized by  the  minority  members  to  represent  them. 

The  necessary  supplemental  authority  came  from  a  secret 
Republican  caucus  held  on  April  5,  1913.  Mr.  Austin,  of 
Tennessee,  offered  the  following  resolution,  which  was  adopted 
unanimously : 

Resolved,  That  the  Republican  membership  of  the  House  be  repre- 
sented by  our  candidate  for  Speaker  in  the  matter  of  representation 
and  recommendation  of  Republican  members  of  the  House  committees 
under  the  rules  of  the  House. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  73 

In  this  same  caucus,  with  ninety-seven  Republicans  present, 
Mr.  Mann  had  been  unanimously  chosen  as  the  Republican 
candidate  for  Speaker. 

Cannon  formerly  organised  the  House  directly  under  the 
rules.  Underwood  and  Mann  have  since  done  it  indirectly,  in 
violation  of  the  spirit  of  the  rules,  one  using  the  Aldrich  ''com- 
mittee on  committees"  method,  and  operating  through  the 
Democratic  caucus,  the  other  employing  the  Cannon  method, 
with  OiUthority  from  both  old  party  caucuses. 

Rkasskmbung  the  Machine 

It  can  be  seen,  then,  that  there  are  three  stages  in  the 
reconstruction,  or  continuation,  of  the  House  machine.  First, 
the  re-elected  leaders,  quietly  and  under  cover,  parcel  out 
coveted  committee  places  and  complete  almost  to  the  last  detail 
the  work  of  reorganization.  This  is  done  soon  after  the  con- 
gressional elections  and  weeks  before  the  new  members  appear 
on  the  scene.  This  initial  manipulation  is  unauthorized  and 
unofficial.  It  is  so  far  removed  from  an  official  organization 
that  the  distance  must  be  divided  by  still  another  unofficial  but 
slightly  more  public  proceeding.  This  is  called  the  majority 
party  caucus.  Because  the  real  organizing  already  done  must 
be  ratified,  the  leaders  arrange  for  an  organization  caucus. 
This  is  the  second  step. 

Then,  on  the  opening  day  of  the  new  Congress,  the  old  rules 
are  readopted  and  the  unofficial,  unauthorized  work  of  the 
reorganizers  is  made  official.  When  that  is  done  it  means 
another  boss-controlled  Congress. 

For  the  Sixty-fourth  Congress  the  hrst  and  second  steps 
have  already  been  taken.  There  is  nothing  authentic  to  dis- 
cuss in  reference  to  the  preliminary  slate  fixing.  That  was  all 
under  cover.  But  the  organization  caucus  of  the  majority 
party  was  held  on  February  4,  1915.  The  more  important 
results  of  tliis  closed  caucus  may  be  summarized  under  five 
heads : 


74  YOUR  CONGRESS 

The  New  Floor  Leader. — This  caucus  was  called  upon  to 
approve  the  old  guard's  selection  of  a  new  floor  leader  to 
replaced  Underwood  (who  had  been  elected  to  the  Senate),  a 
position  more  important  than  that  of  the  Speakership.  Claude 
Kitchin,  of  North  Carolina,  had  been  agreed  upon  for  chair- 
man of  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee,  which  carried  with  it 
the  office  of  floor  leader,  and  the  caucus  approved  as  a  matter 
of  course.  Mr.  Kitchin's  record  in  the  House  is  that  of  the 
ordinary  machine  member.  He  voted  against  the  open  caucus. 
He  voted  against  Republican  gag  rules  and  for  Democratic  gag 
rules.  He  voted  against  woman  suffrage.  He  voted,  on  Feb- 
ruary 15,  1915,  against  the  Palmer  child  labor  bill.     "* 

Clark  for  Speaker. — Next  in  importance  in  the  work  of  this 
closed  caucus  was  its  ratification  of  Champ  Clark  as  the  Demo- 
cratic candidate  for  Speaker.  This  office  has  been  shorn  of 
much  of  its  power,  but  during  the  last  two  Congresses  Mr. 
Clark  has  demonstrated  no  inclination  to  reform  undemo- 
cratic parliamentary  conditions. 

The  Ways  and  Means  Committee. — This  closed  caucus  ap- 
proved the  slate  in  reference  to  the  Democratic  membership  of 
this  all-important  committee.  Upon  the  motion  of  Champ 
Clark,  Messrs.  H.  T.  Rainey,  L.  Dixon,  C.  Hull,  J.  N.  Garner, 
J.  W.  Collier,  C.  C.  Dickinson  and  M.  F.  Conroy  were  chosen 
to  succeed  themselves  on  that  committee.  Vacancies  were 
filled  by  the  selection  of  A.  G.  Allen,  D.  J.  McGilHcuddy, 
G.  T.  Helvering,  J.  J.  Casey,  C.  R.  Crisp  and  W.  A.  Oldfield. 
These  Democratic  members  of  the  Ways  and  Means  Com- 
mittee were  next  authorized  to  "organize"  the  new  House. 

chairman  of  the  Caucus. — The  only  contest  was  over  the 
chairmanship  of  the  Democratic  caucus.  E.  W.  Saunders,  of 
Virginia,  received  108  votes  and  Martin  D.  Foster,  of  Illinois, 
86  votes,  the  doubtful  honor  going  to  the  former.  This  meant 
the  reorganization  of  the  caucus  machinery  for  the  next 
Congress. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  75 

Out  of  this  closed  caucus,  meeting  behind  barred_  and  bolted 
doors,  with  no  sight  or  sound  of  its  proceedings  reaching  the 
public,  the  new  House  regime  was  born. 

The  Part  the  Caucus  Plays 

Leadership,  to  be  effective,  must  be  based  upon  something 
more  than  personal  power.  The  party  "leader,"  in  order  to 
have  a  following,  must  have  at  his  disposal  spoils  with  which 
to  reward  his  followers.  In  the  House  these  rewards  take  the 
form  of  favored  committee  places,  patronage,  perquisites, 
prestige,  etc.  It  is  instructive  to  note  how  Mann  and  Under- 
wood came  to  occupy  the  positions  they  undeniably  held  as 
respective  leaders  of  the  Republican  and  Democratic  regulars 
in  the  last  House.  The  method  is  simple.  It  should  be  under- 
stood, however,  because  it  illustrates  the  comparative  impor- 
tance of  caucuses  and  committees,  their  dependence  each  upon 
the  other,  their  respective  contributions  to  the  building  of  the 
organization. 

Take  the  case  of  Mr.  Mann.  Before  the  last  Congress  was 
organized,  the  leaders  of  his  party  apparently  effected  a  ten- 
tative combination  of  re-elected  Republicans.  (The  new 
members  are  always  excluded  from  real  participation  in  the 
organization.)  With  this  assumed  power,  they  went  into  the 
Republican  caucus.  The  caucus  ratified  their  tentative  action, 
making  Mr.  Mann  their  candidate  for  Speaker,  their  floor 
leader,  and  giving  him  authority  over  the  Republican  member- 
ship of  committees.  Thus  was  the  assumed  power  made  real. 
Mr.  Mann  then  had  actual  control  of  the  regulars  of  his  party 
because  their  congressional  fortunes  were  largely  in  his  hands. 
It  was  much  the  same  on  the  Democratic  side,  only  the  pro- 
cedure in  that  camp  was  more  complex  and  mystifying. 

Neither  party  caucus  could  have  become  a  dominating  force 
in  the  beginning  without  a  tentative  "organization"  to  bring  it 
into  being.  Neither  caucus  could  long  remain  intact  without 
a  real  organization  back  of  it.  In  fact,  a  caucus  is  only  the 
manifestation  of  an  organization.     One  man,  or  a  few  men. 


re  YOUR  CONGRESS 

can  control  a  caucus  only  when  they  have  gained  control  of 
the  membership  of  the  caucus  through  domination  of  the 
machine — which  means  the  regular  committees. 

The  power  of  the  caucus  lies  in  the  popular  belief  that  it  is 
an  institution  of  real  power.  It  is  not.  It  has  no  power  except 
that  born  of  the  fear  of  it.  When  its  bluflf  and  bluster  fail, 
the  caucus  is  a  weak,  timorous  thing  that  shies  at  its  own 
shadow.  So  false  is  its  foundation,  so  indefensible  is  its  place 
in  the  machinery  of  legislation  that,  by  bolting  and  advertising 
their  insurgency  throughout  the  country,  no  more  than  ten 
determined  members  can  bring  about  its  disruption  at  any  time. 

This  misunderstanding  of  the  people  is  based  largely  on  the 
belief  that  the  caucus  can  bind  reluctant  members  to  unanimity. 
That  is  false.  The  action  of  a  caucus  binds  only  those  mem- 
bers who  were  bound  by  the  ''organization"  before  the  caucus 
acted.  No  one  ever  heard  of  a  caucus  where  the  leaders  were 
not  in  harmony  as  to  the  course  to  be  taken.  Why  did  not  the 
Democrats  caucus  and  unite  in  the  fight  to  repeal  free  tolls? 

The  greatest  fallacy  of  all  is  the  contention  that  the  caucus 
sometimes  is  used  to  promote  good  legislation.  The  caucus 
in  its  influence  is  always  obstructive,  and  never  constructive. 
Not  once  in  the  last  Congress  did  the  caucus  contribute  the 
deciding  factor  of  strength  to  secure  the  passage  of  a  measure. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  was  employed  repeatedly  to  shield  and 
mantle  with  vague,  shifting  irresponsibility  the  obstructive 
tactics  of  so-called  leaders. ^^ 


1*  Take  the  tariff  for  example.  The  passage  of  the  tariff  bill  was  inevitable.  The  caucus 
did  not  promote  its  passage.  What  the  caucus  did  was  to  obstruct  and  prevent  the  open 
consideration  of  all  sorts  of  features  of  the  tariff  bill,  which  was  made  possible  by  the 
unprotesting  acquiescence  of  members  in  its  straw-man  strength.  The  caucus  prevented 
the  adoption  of  amendments;  it  precluded  "schedule  by  schedule"  consideration;  it  saved 
the  politicians  from  record  votes  on  various  amendments  and  schedules ;  it  obstructed  every 
effort  to  remove  inequities  from  the  measure. 

It  was  the  same  with  the  currency  bill.  The  caucus  did  not  pass  that  measure.  It  only 
obstructed  amendments.  The  caucus  operated  to  prevent  the  incorporation  in  the  bill  of 
such  vital  features  as  an  interlocking  directorates  prohibition  and  a  provision  for  rural 
credits. 

In  the  adoption  of  the  administration's  "trust  program"  by  the  caucus,  there  was  the 
same  undeniable  evidence  of  obstruction  rather  than  construction.  What  those  in  control 
may  have  desired  was  not  $o  much  to  pass  those  measures  as  to  keep  certain  provisions  out 
of  them,  and,  by  giving  them  the  right  of  way,  to  postpone  the  consideration  of  other 
matters  upon  which  the  House  preferred  not  to  vote. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  77 

The  caucus  assumes  and  exercises  responsibility  for  the 
organization  and  activities  of  the  House.  But  who  in  the 
caucus  is  responsible?  There's  the  rub.  How  is  it  possible 
to  reduce  the  responsibility  down  to  individuals  ?  If  the  caucus 
has  any  power,  regardless  of  what  form  of  power  it  may  be — 
negative,  obstructive,  or  even  a  kind  of  positive  power  based 
on  the  tolerant  ignorance  of  participants  and  people — it  is  an 
irresponsible  power.  When  you  try  to  fix  responsibility  for 
anything  the  caucus  does  or  does  not  do,  the  outlines  of  indi- 
viduals, dimly  seen  even  at  first,  gradually  dissolve  into  a 
misty  mass.^^ 

Yet  the  majority  party  caucus,  an  unofficial  institution, 
essentially  secret,  its  meetings  held  behind  barred  and  bolted 
doors,  with  no  record  of  the  debate,  not  even  a  sound  escap- 
ing; with  no  assured  integrity  of  the  meager  records  it  does 
keep;  with  absolutely  no  power  to  prevent  dodging  or  the 
manipulation  of  quorums;  with  its  portals  ever  open  to  pork- 
barrel  bargainers,  and  all  the  underground  influences  of 
politics;  with  rarely  more  than  a  fourth  of  the  whole  mem- 
bership of  the  House  doing  the  deciding,  has  often  usurped  the 
official  functions  of  the  House  itself. 

A  small  minority  may  prevail  over  the  whole  House  through 
the  caucus.  The  caucus  is  the  instrument  of  a  minority;  it 
means  minority  rule,  the  most  undemocratic  thing  in  the  cata- 
logue of  political  perversities. 

It  is  indefensible  enough  when  a  minority  in  the  caucus  pre- 
sumes to  act  for  the  House,  but  that  is  not  the  worst  of  it. 
The  caucus  has  become  the  last  refuge  of  the  dodgers.  Those 
actually  responsible  for  not  bringing  politically  dangerous 
questions  before  the  House  for  an  open  vote  seek  shelter  in 
the  failure  of  the  caucus  to  command  them  to  do  so. 


"  Sometimes  there  are  roll  calls  in  the  caucus.  These  have  little  value.  Two  years 
ago  I  published  a  caucus  roll  call  and  a  now  nameless  Democrat  claimed  rny  report  was 
incorrect,  that  he  had  voted  the  other  way.  And  he  got  other  Democrats  to  join  him  in  the 
deception.  I  expected  that  there  would  be  an  attempt  to  change  the  caucus  minutes  and 
hurried  witnesses  there  who  are  ready  at  any  time  to  testify  that  my  report  was  a  true  copy 
of  the  original  records.  But  when  caucus  roll  calls  are  disputed,  as  in  this  case,  what  can 
be  done  about  it?  The  members  may  lie  about  their  attitude,  and  there  is  no  official 
evidence  to  the  contrary.  Caucus  records  are  ■  unofficial.  The  caucus  itself  is  wholly 
unofficial. 


K 


78V  YOUR  CONGRESS 


Xog  jams"  are  the  modern  politicians'  chief  delight.  When 
the  calendars  become  so  congested  and  obstructed  with  appro- 
priation measures  and  special  orders  that  dangerous  issues  can- 
not be  reached,  then  ordinary  Congres^nen  are  in  bliss.  In 
the  first  session  of  the  last  Congress,  the  caucus  passed  a  reso- 
lution forbidding  standing  committees  to  report  bills  to  the 
House  without  express  permission  from  the  caucus. 

During  all  that  period  this  meant  a  double  check  upon  com- 
mittees. The  "reformed  rules"  gave  the  House  no  practical 
power  to  compel  reluctant  committees  to  report  business ;  that 
was  one  side  of  it.  On  the  other  hand,  if  standing  committees 
desired  to  act  on  bills  and  advance  the  work  of  Congress, 
there  was  this  caucus  mandate  to  obstruct  them.  In  that  way 
the  caucus  contributed  to  a  ''log  jam"  which  was  so  complete 
as  to  make  the  Rules  Committee  almost  the  absolute  dictator 
of  what  the  House  did  or  did  not  do. 

Then,  with  Calendar  Wednesday  filibustered  and  disre- 
garded out  of  countenance,  the  only  possible  way  to  get  any- 
thing not  privileged  before  the  House  was  through  a  special 
rule  from  the  Rules  Committee,  and  the  Rules  Committee, 
although  the  caucus  may  not  have  whispered  *'thou  shalt  not," 
refused  to  act  until  the  caucus  thundered  "thou  shalt."  Neither 
the  Committee  on  Rules  nor  any  other  committee  is  in  any 
official  way  responsible  to  the  caucus,  but  the  game  worked 
because  the  excuse  was  convenient,  and  the  people  too  far 
away  to  understand. 

Partyism  is  the  parent  evil  in  Congress.  The  caucus  is  the 
last  and  fullest  expression  of  partyism. 

Secre:cy  of  the:  Caucus 

Only  the  dominant  party  uses  the  caucus  regularly.  The 
minority  have  no  need  of  caucuses,  except  to  organize  their 
hungry  forces.  In  the  old  Cannon  days  the  Republicans  had 
a  caucus.  They  have  it  yet.  They  used  it  in  the  last  Congress 
to  select  James  R.  Mann,  a  former  Cannon  lieutenant,  as 
their  candidate  for  Speaker.     Then,  after  carefully  oiling  it 


YOUR  CONGRESS  79 

and  giving  it  a  good  coating  of  publicity  about  "open  caucus 
meetings" — to  prevent  the  rust  of  unpopularity — they  placed 
it  in  the  machine  shed.  It  is  there  now,  without  a  nut  loose. 
The  Republican  caucus  which  decided  that  Mr.  Mann 
should  be  the  organizing  head  of  the  Republicans  was  held  in 
secret.  There  was  no  further  need  of  a  secret  caucus  on  the 
minority  side.  The  Republicans  had  nothing  to  do  but  pro- 
test, and  partisan  protests  are  for  political  purposes;  they 
abhor  barred  doors  and  closed  shutters.  Accordingly  at  a 
subsequent  session  the  Republican  caucus  adopted  a  resolution 
declaring  for  open  meetings.    But — 

This  amendment,  offered  by  I.  L.  Lenroot,  of  Wisconsin, 
was  made  a  part  of  the  resolution:  ''Provided,  That  the  con- 
ference or  caucus  may  go  into  executive  session  at  any  time 
by  a  majority  vote  of  those  present/' 

That  joker  made  the  resolution  meaningless.  The  amend- 
ment left  things  about  as  they  were.  It  meant  that  they  could 
have  open  meetings  when  nothing  important  was  being  con- 
sidered and  that  they  could  go  into  secret  session  when  mat- 
ters were  up  which,  in  the  politicians'  judgment,  ought  to  be 
kept  out  of  sight.  The  fact  that  the  Republicans  had  resolved 
against  closed  caucuses  went  all  over  the  country,  but  I  do  not 
recall  anything  in  the  public  prints  which  pointed  out  the  life- 
size  loophole  in  their  publicity  "reform."  As  a  rule,  wood- 
chucks  like  that  rarely  get  their  pictures  in  the  papers. 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  the  majority  party  caucus,  and  not 
the  House,  makes  the  rules,  ratifies  the  organization  and  deter- 
mines the  details  of  much  important  legislation,  the  question  of 
whether  or  not  its  sessions  shall  be  held  behind  closed  doors 
is  vital.  This  issue  was  decided  by  the  caucus  on  April  8, 
1913.  Mr.  Shackelford,  of  Missouri,  offered  the  following 
resolution : 

"Resolved,  That  this  Caucus  shall  be  open  to  the  press,  to  the  Presi- 
dent, to  the  Senators,  and  to  the  Cabinet  officers,  and  that  the  Presi- 
dent, the  Senators  and  the  Cabinet  officers  may  occupy  seats  upon 
the  floor." 


80  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Mr.  Carlin,  of  Virginia,  moved  the  adoption  of  the  follow- 
ing substitute: 

"Resolved,  That  hereafter  all  Democratic  caucuses  or  conferences, 
when  called  either  by  the  membership  or  by  the  chairman  of  the 
caucus,  shall  be  open  to  the  public." 

Mr.  Hay,  of  Virginia,  moved  that  both  resolution  and  sub- 
stitute be  referred  to  a  committee  of  three,  to  report  later. 

Mr.  Thomas,  of  Kentucky,  moved  that  all  resolutions  and 
motions  be  tabled,  thus  defeating  the  attempt  to  secure  open 
meetings.    The  Thomas  motion  was  adopted,  167  to  84. 

Disfranchising   Members 

In  practical  operation  the  caucus  disfranchises  every  Con- 
gressman who  does  not  participate  in  caucus  legislation.  That 
means  all  minority  members,  in  the  last  Congress  one-third 
of  the  membership  of  the  House.  As  will  be  shown,  many 
more  are  indirectly  disfranchised  by  being  outvoted  in  the 
caucus. 

Members  who  participate  in  a  caucus,  either  through  igno- 
rance of  its  straw-man  strength  or  a  desire  to  justify  their 
position  before  the  public,  feel  that  they  are  bound  to  abide 
by  the  decisions  of  the  caucus,  and  to  carry  out  its  decrees. 
Take  away  from  a  caucus  that  cardinal  fiction  and  it  is  no 
longer  a  caucus.  Without  assuming  the  power  to  bind  its 
members  to  a  unanimity,  a  caucus  becomes  only  a  conference. 
Obviously,  then,  a  majority  of  the  caucus  "controls"  its  own 
minority,  and,  when  it  is  a  caucus  of  the  predominant  party, 
a  majority  of  the  caucus  controls  the  whole  membership  of  the 
House. 

A  rule  of  the  Democratic  caucus  provides  that  two-thirds  of 
those  present  shall  be  necessary  to  bind  the  caucus,  with  the 
added  provision  that  those  two-thirds  must  be  a  majority  of 
the  whole  membership  of  the  caucus,  but  this  rule  is  not  en- 
forced.   A  majority  of  those  present  determine  the  issue  for  all. 

The  last  House  had  435  members.  Of  these  291  were 
Democrats.     All   Democrats  were  members  of   the  majority 


YOUR  CONGRESS  81 

party  caucus.  The  "binding"  principle  compelled  practically 
all  members  of  the  caucus  to  vote  later  on  the  floor  of  the 
House  as  a  majority  of  those  present  decided  in  the  caucus.^^ 

Mathematically,  this  minority  rule,  through  the  disfran- 
chising process,  works  out  as  follows : 

Whole  membership  of  the  House  in  1913-15,  435  members. 

291  I  124  I       20 

Democrats  |  Rep.  |     Prog. 

When  an  issue  is  decided  in  the  closed  caucus,  which  "binds" 
practically  all  Democrats  to  vote  as  a  unit  later  when  the  same 
issue  is  brought  formally  before  the  House,  it  means  that  both 
Republicans  and  Progressives  have  been  disfranchised,  that 
their  votes  have  been  nullified  in  advance,  that  all  subsequent 
official  proceedings  after  the  caucus  has  acted  are  only  sham 
battles.    This  may  be  illustrated  by  shortening  the  line  thus : 

291  I 

Democrats  1 

Analyzing  a  step  farther,  we  find  that  the  issue  in  the 
caucus  might  be  decided  by  a  vote  of  146  to  145.  The  line 
could  then  be  pictured: 

146  I  145 


Democrats 

The  145,  being  outvoted  in  the  caucus,  would  feel  compelled 
by  caucus  "principles"  to  vote  with  the  146  on  the  floor  of  the 


21  The  binding  principle  was  specifically  invoked  in  the  case  of  the  tariff  bill  by  the 
following  resolution  offered  by  Mr.  Underwood,  which  was  adopted  without  a  roll  call: 

"Resolved,  That  the  tariff  bill  passed  by  this  caucus  in  its  amended  form  is  declared 
to  be  a  party  measure  and  that  the  members  of  this  caucus  are  hereby  pledged  to  support 
the  bill  m  the  House  of  Representatives  and  to  vote  against  all  amendments  or  motions  to 
recommit  the  bill;  Provided,  however.  That  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee  are  authorized 
to  propose  amendments  to  the  bill  and  that  shall  not  be  considered  as  included  in  the 
foregoing  inhibition." 

Again,  at  the  conclusion  of  the  caucus  consideration  of  the  currency  bill  on  Mr.  Under- 
wood's motion  a  similar  resolution  was  adopted: 

"Resolved,  That  the  Currency  Bill  adopted  by  this  caucus  be  declared  a  party  measure 
and  the  members  of  this  caucus  are  pledged  to  vote  for  the  bill  to  its  final  passage  without 
amendment;  Provided  that  the  Banking  and  Cvirrency  Committee  may  offer  amendments 
in  the  House." 

These  resolutions  meant  that  all  the  issues  in  both  the  tariff  and  the  currency  bills  had 
been  decided  by  the  caucus;  that  the  caucus,  and  not  the  House,  determined  both  the 
principles  and  the  details  of  legislation;  that  subsequent  official  proceedings  on  the  floor  of 
the  House  were  only  to  comply  with  legal  formalities  and  to  carry  out  the  pretense  of 
deliberation. 


82  YOUR  CONGRESS 

House.     So  far  as  the  determining  power  is  concerned,  the 
Hne  would  be  reduced  again : 

146  I 

A  majority  of  the  majority.  «* 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  through  what  is  called  "the  organiza- 
tion," the  minority  which  actually  controls  becomes  very  much 
smaller.  A  careful  study  of  the  caucus  records  shows  that, 
with  not  a  single  important  exception,  the  caucus  when  con- 
sidering the  details  of  legislation  ratified  the  action  of  a  ma- 
jority part  of  the  standing  committee  which  had  the  bill  in 
charge.  The  caucus  acted  upon  211  amendments  to  the  tariff 
bill.  With  hardly  an  exception  every  amendment  adopted  came 
from  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee.    It  was  the  same  with 


2*  It  should  be  noted  in  this  connection  that  the  whole  democratic  membership  was 
never  present  at  any  caucus  meeting.  The  highest  vote  cast  on  any  caucus  roll  call  was 
251.     The  caucus  records  show  that  frequently  many  less  than  a  quorum  were  present. 

The  following  figures  reveal  the  number  actually  present  and  voting  on  some  roll  calls 
taken  in  the  caucus  during  the  Sixty-third  Congress: 

April  8,  1913,  on  the  question  of  the  open  caucus,  84  for  to  167  against. 

April  14,  to  put  cattle  on  the  free  list,  81  for  to  124  against. 

April  17,  to  take  wool  off  the  free  list  in  the  tariff  bill  and  impose  a  duty  of  15  per  cent 
ad  valorem,  42  for  to  196  against. 

April  17,  to  place  ready  made  clothing  on  the  free  list,  70  for  to  96  against. 

April  19,  to  take  from  the  tariff  bill  the  ship  subsidy  provision  granting  a  5  per  cent  rebate 
of  the  tariff  on  goods  handled  in  American  ships,  58  for  to  124  against. 

August  22,  to  put  in  the  ctwrency  bill  a  provision  forbidding  interlocking  directorates, 
6o  for  to  143  against. 

August  23,  the  Wingo  arnendment  limiting  the  voting  power  of  banks  owning  other 
banks  in  the  election  of  district  reserve  boards,  46  for  to  95  against. 

August  23,  the  Murray  amendment  to  increase  the  number  of  directors  of  the  new  bank- 
ing system,  47  for  to  100  against. 

August  25,  the  Gray  amendment  fixing  geographical  districts  for  the  new  reserve  system, 
55  for  to  85  against, 

August  25,  the  Barkley  amendment  eliminating  the  advisory  council,  64  for  to  107 
against. 

August  28,  to  take  from  the  table  a  motion  involving  the  sending  of  rural  credits  amend- 
ments to  the  Banking  and  Currency  Committee,  166  for  to  66  against. 

These  figures  show  that  in  only  two  roll  calls  did  more  than  a  majority  of  the  whole 
membership  of  the  caucus  vote  with  the  side  which  controlled.  Yet  in  every  case  the 
number  which  decided  any  issue  in  the  caucus  bound  practically  all  of  the  291  democrats 
later  to  vote  the  same  way  when  the  issue  came  before  the  House. 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  caucus  acted  upon  several  hundred  different  matters  in  which 
there  were  no  roll  calls.  It  is  nearly  as  difficult  to  get  a  record  vote  in  the  caucus  as  it  is 
in  the  House.  Numerous  attempts  were  made  to  obtain  a  caucus  roll  call  which  failed 
because  the  necessary  one-fifth  of  those  present  did  not  join  in  the  demand.  One  notable 
example  of  this  was  when,  at  the  beginning  of  caucus  consideration  of  the  currency  bill, 
Mr.  Neeley,  of  Kansas,  moved  that  the  doors  of  the  caucus  be  thrown  open  to  the  public. 
On  a  division  there  were  63  ayes  and  119  nays.  Mr.  Neeley  then  asked  for  a  roll  call,  but 
it  was  refused. 

The  caucus  acted  on  314  amendments  to  the  tariff  and  currency  bills,  only  ten  of  which 
were  decided  by  roll  calls.  In  addition,  the  caucus,  without  record  votes,  decided  numerous 
motions  involving  patronage,  instructions  to  committees  as  to  the  reporting  of  bills,  etc.,  etc. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  83 

the  currency  bill,  which  was  considered  first  by  the  Democratic 
members  of  the  Committee  on  Banking  and  Currency,  all 
minority  members  of  that  committee  being  excluded  according 
to  the  caucus  "principle"  of  rule  through  a  majority  of  the 
majority.  The  caucus  acted  on  103  amendments  to  the  cur- 
rency bill  in  which  a  majority  of  the  Democratic  majority  of 
the  banking  committee  were  sustained. 
This  may  be  delineated  as  follows : 

Banking  and  Currency  Committee,  twenty-one  members — 


Democrats  Minority 

First  the  minority  members  would  be  cut  off- 

14 


Democrats 


Next,  as  the  Democratic  part  of  that  committee  actually 
divided  on  several  important  amendments — 


Democrats 

Then  the  line  would  show- 


A  majority  of  the  majority  of  the  committee. 

These  eight  would  seem  to  have,  at  least  they  assumed  and 
exercised,  greater  power  than  all  the  other  members  of  the 
House.  In  the  case  of  the  interlocking  directorates  amendment 
to  the  currency  bill  the  Democratic  part  of  the  Committee 
on  Banking  and  Currency  divided  5  for  to  9  against.  The  nine, 
backed  by  the  organization,  prevailed  through  the  whole 
machine. 

By  applying  the  vicious  principle  of  rule  through  a  majority 
of  the  majority,  that  is,  the  exclusion  of  all  minority  members 
at  every  stage — in  standing  committees,  the  caucus  and  con- 
ference committees— the  caucus  has  become  Congress  in  all 


84 


YOUR  CONGRESS 


matters  where  the  caucus  acts.  Those  without  the  caucus 
have  little  more  voice  in  legislation  than  as  though  never 
elected  to  Congress.  This  means  that  every  district  not  repre- 
sented by  a  member  of  the  majority  party  is  practically  without 
representation.^^ 

It  has  been  demonstrated  that  at  least  as  many  more  were 
indirectly  disfranchised  by  being  outvoted  in  the  caucus. 

The  map  on  the  next  page  locates  the  disfranchised  districts 
and  shows  also  the  geographic  centers  of  real  authority  in  the 
last  Congress.    The  territory  represented  by  Republicans  and 


"  Under  the  present  system,  in  the  last  congress,  not  counting  the  territories. 


Alabama, 

Arizona, 

Arkansas, 

California, 

Colorado, 

Connecticut, 

Delaware, 

Florida. 

Georgia, 

Idaho, 

Illinois, 

Indiana, 

Iowa, 

Kansas, 

Kentucky, 

Louisiana, 

Maine, 

Maryland, 

Massachusetts, 

Michigan, 

Minnesota, 

Mississippi, 

Missouri, 

Montana, 

Nebraska, 

Nevada, 


Ohio. 

Oklahoma, 

Oregon, 

Pennsylvantia, 

Rhode  Island, 

South  Carolina, 

South  Dakota, 

Tennessee, 

Texas, 

Utah. 

Vermont, 

Virginia, 

Washington, 

West  Virginia, 

Wisconsin, 

Wyoming, 


with  10  Representatives,  had 

with    1  Representative,   had 

with    7  Representatives,  had 

with  11  Representatives,  had 

with    4  Representatives,  had 

with    5  Representatives,  had 

with    1  Representative,   had 

with    4  Representatives,  had 

with  12  Representatives,  had 

with    2  Representatives,  had 

with  27  Representatives,  had 

with  13  Representatives,  had 

with  11  Representatives,  had 

with    8  Representatives,  had 

with  1 1  Representatives,  had 

with    8  Representatives,  had 

with    4  Representatives,  had 

with    6  Representatives,  had 

with  16  Representatives,  had 

with  13  Representatives,  had 

with  10  Representatives,  had 

with    8  Representatives,  had 

with  16  Representatives,  had 

with    2  Representatives,  had 

with    6  Representatives,  had 

with  1  Representative,  had 
New  Hampshire,  with  2  Representatives,  had 
New  Jersey,  with  12  Representatives,  had 

New  Mexico,        with    1  Representative,   had 
New  York,  with  43  Representatives,  had  12  disfranchised 

North  Carolina,   with  10  Representatives,  had    0  disfranchised 
North  Dakota,     with    3  Representatives,  had    3  disfranchised 

with  22  Representatives,  had    3  disfranchised 

with    8  Representatives,  had    2  disfranchised 

with    3  Representatives,  had    3  disfranchised 

with  36  Representatives,  had  24  disfranchised 

with    3  Representatives,  had    1  disfranchised 

with    7  Representatives,  had 

with    3  Representatives,  had 

with  10  Representatives,  had 

with  18  Representatives,  had 

with    2  Representatives,  had 

with    2  Representatives,  had 

with  10  Representatives,  had 

with    5  Representatives,  had 

with    6  Representatives,  had 

with  1 1  Representatives,  had 

with    1  Representative,   had 


0  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 
8  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 

2  disfranchised 

7  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 

8  disfranchised 

3  disfranchised 

2  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 

3  disfranchised 

0  disfranchised 

8  disfranchised 

1  disfranchised 

9  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 

2  disfranchised 

0  disfranchised 

3  disfranchised 

1  disfranchised 

0  disfranchised 

1  disfranchised 
0  disfranchised 


0  disfranchised 

3  disfranchised 
2  disfranchised 

0  disfranchised 
2  disfranchised 
2  disfranchised 

1  disfranchised 
5  disfranchised 

4  disfranchised 
8  disfranchised 
1  disfranchised 


86  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Progressives,  who  have  practically  no  voice  in  legislation,  is 
shown  by  the  black  sections  on  the  map.  The  shaded  sections 
show  those  districts  represented  by  Democrats,  who  are  com- 
paratively unimportant  parts  of  the  dominant  legislative 
machine.  The  districts  in  white  are  those  represented  by  the 
chairmen  of  the  appropriation,  or  "pork  barrel,"  committees, 
and  the  other  committees  which  determine  practically  all  legis- 
lation, as  follows : 

LEGISI.ATIVE  Committees 

Name  of  Com.  Chairman.  Dist.  and  State. 

Ways  and  Means  . . .  Oscar  W.  Underwood  9th   Alabama. 

Rules    Robert  L.  Henry  11th  Texas. 

Judiciary   , Henry  D.  Clayton   3d  Alabama. 

Bank,  and  Cur Carter  Glass 6th  Virginia. 

Int.    Commerce  Wm.  C.  Adamson   4th  Georgia. 

Labor   David  J.  Lewis  6th  Maryland. 

For.  Affairs   Henry  D.  Flood  10th  Virginia. 

Immigration  John  L.  Burnett  7th  Alabama. 

Public  Lands  Scott  Ferris  5th  Oklahoma. 

Mer.  Marine   J.  W.  Alexander 3d  Missouri. 

Appropriation  Committees 

Appropriations    John  J.  Fitzgerald  7th  New  York 

Agriculture    Asbury  F.  Lever   7th   South   Carolina. 

Claims    Edward  W.  Pou   4th  North  Carolina. 

Dist.  of  Col Ben  Johnson   4th  Kentucky. 

Indian  Affairs  John  H.  Stephens   13th  Texas. 

Military  Affairs    James  Hay  7th  Virginia. 

Naval  Affairs    Lemuel  P.  Padgett   7th   Tennessee. 

Pensions    WilHam  Richardson   8th  Alabama. 

Postoffice    John  A.  Moon   3d    Tennessee. 

Public   Buildings    . . .  Frank   Clark    2d   Florida. 

Rivers  and  Harbors.  Stephen  M.  Sparkman 1st  Florida. 

Roac^  D.   W.    Shackleford    8th  Missouri. 

Organization  and  Controi.  of  Committees 

It  should  be  kept  constantly  in  mind  that  minority  rule  is 
the  common  object  of  the  caucus  and  the  organization  which 
grows  out  of  the  caucus.  Minority  rule,  even  when  not  car- 
ried to  the  final  extreme  as  in  the  Sixty-third  Congress,  means 
domination  by  a  few  leaders.  This  bossism  in  Congress  is 
based  on  obstructive  power.  In  the  last  analysis  obstructive 
power  means  also  the  power  to  legislate. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  87 

Therefore,  more  important  than  the  naming  of  committees 
is  the  control  of  committees.  During  the  Cannon  regime,  if 
a  mere  majority  of  a  committee  chose  to  pigeon-hole  a  bill, 
all  the  other  members  of  the  House  were  powerless  to  compel 
action;  even  an  overwhelming  majority  of  the  House  had  no 
power  to  bring  the  measure  out  into  the  open.  Each  commit- 
tee had  complete  obstructive  power.  When  public  opinion 
and  the  persistent  fighting  of  the  little  band  of  insurgents 
forced  the  leaders  to  give  attention  to  this  condition,  some 
significant  things  happened. 

first,  as  is  always  the  case  when  the  ''organisation''  is  threat- 
ened with  any  real  change  in  the  system,  the  leaders  of  both 
old  parties  ceased  their  sham  battles  and  joined  forces  to  save 
the  day. 

Next,  as  is  invariably  true  of  such  situations,  the  bi-partisan 
leaders  assumed  the  role  of  reformers  and  themselves  initiated 
the  new  rule  which  was  supposed  to  end  the  pigeon-holing  of 
bills  and  to  make  standing  committees  serve  the  wishes  and 
interests  of  the  House  as  a  whole. 

John  Dalzell,  of  Pennsylvania,  one  of  Speaker  Cannon's 
leading  lieutenants,  was  then  the  Republican  head  of  the  Com- 
mittee on  Rules.  Champ  Clark,  of  Missouri,  was  the  ranking 
Democratic  member.  This  committee,  on  June  17,  1910,  re- 
ported a  new  rule  which  provided  for  "A  Calendar  of  Motions 
to  Discharge  Committees."  The  bi-partisan  combination  back 
of  this  move  was  apparent:  Mr.  Clark,  a  Democrat,  in  the 
debate  said  he  was  the  author  of  the  resolution;  Mr.  Dalzell, 
a  Republican,  offered  it  to  the  House  and  moved  its  adoption. 
The  usual  parliamentary  methods  prevailed.  No  opportunity 
was  given  to  amend  the  rule  thus  presented.  It  was  adopted, 
without  a  roll  call. 

The  issue  involved  in  this  new  rule  was  by  far  the  most  im- 
portant, in  a  parliamentary  sense,  that  has  been  before  the 
House  in  a  decade.  So  long  as  the  House  as  a  whole  could 
not  exercise  control  of  its  committees,  a  few  leaders  would. 


88  YOUR  CONGRESS 

The  method  of  appointment  made  little  difference.  Bear  that 
fundamental  fact  in  mind  as  we  proceed  with  an  interpretation 
of  what  happened  then  and  since  in  respect  to  this  "reform."^* 
This  rule,  instead  of  being  an  adequate  remedy,  contained 
numerous  "jokers"  which  made  it  ridiculous  and  an  insult  to 
the  public.    Some  of  them  were : 

1.  The  Calendar  of  Motions  to  Discharge  Committees  could 
be  reached  only  twice  a  month.  The  Unanimous  Consent 
Calendar,  which  always  preceded  this  order  of  business,  came 
before  the  House  on  only  the  first  and  third  Mondays  of  each 
month. 

2.  The  new  calendar  could  be  used  only  after  business  on  the 
Unanimous  Consent  Calendar  had  been  finished.  This  afforded 
all  sorts  of  opportunity  to  filibuster  and  thus  prevented  action 
under  the  rule. 

3.  No  motion  filed  on  this  calendar  could  be  even  considered 
until  first  seconded  by  a  majority  of  those  present,  as  many  as 
were  required  to  pass  a  bill. 

4.  These  handicaps  were  of  small  consequence  compared  to 
the  final  safeguard  put  into  the  rule.  Read  this  part  again: 
''Such  motions  shall  require  for  adoption  an  affirmative  vote 
of  a  majority  of  the  membership  of  the  House!'  It  required, 
then,  as  now,  only  a  majority  of  those  present  to  pass  a  bill. 
But  the  authors  of  the  resolution  so  doctored  it  that  a  larger 
vote  should  be  necessary  to  get  a  bill  out  of  a  committee  than 
to  secure  its  final  passage.     This  rule  provided  that  no  bill 


2<  Even  a  casual  reading  of  this  Dalzell-CIark  rule  makes  perfectly  patent  the  fact  that 
it  was  unworkable.     It  reads  as  follows: 

"Any  Member  may  present  to  the  Clerk  a  motion  in  writing  to  discharge  a  committee 
from  further  consideration  of  any  public  bill  or  joint  resolution  which  may  have  been  re- 
ferred to  such  committee.  All  such  motions  shall  be  entered  in  the  Journal  and  printed  on 
the  calendar  under  an  appropriate  heading.  Immediately  after  the  Unanimous  Consent 
Calendar  shall  have  been  called  on  any  Monday,  it  shall  be  in  order  to  call  up  any  such 
motion  which  shall  have  been  entered  at  least  seven  days  prior  thereto.  Recognition  for 
such  motions  shall  be  in  the  order  in  which  they  have  been  entered.  Such  motions  before 
being  submitted  to  the  House  shall  be  seconded  by  a  majority  by  tellers.  If  a  second  be 
ordered  debate  on  such  motion  shall  be  limited  to  twenty  minutes,  one-half  thereof  in  favor 
of  the  proposition  and  one-half  in  opposition  thereto.  Such  motions  shall  have  precedence 
over  motions  to  suspend  the  rules  and  shall  require  for  adoption  an  affirmative  vote  of  a 
majority  of  the  membership  of  the  House. 

"Whenever  such  a  motion  shall  prevail  the  bill  so  taken  from  the  consideration  of  a 
committee  shall  thereupon  be  placed  upon  its  appropriate  calendar  and  upon  call  of  the 
committee  from  which  any  bill  has  been  so  taken  it  may  be  called  for  consideration  by  any 
Member  prior  to  any  bill  reported  by  said  committee  at  a  date  subsequent  to  the  discharge 
of  said  committee." 


YOUR  CONGRESS  89 

could  be  withdrawn  from  a  committee  except  by  a  vote  of 
more  than  half  of  the  whole  House — at  present  218  mem- 
bers— an  almost  impossible  number.  Considering  that  the 
number  actually  present  during  business  hours  in  the  House 
then,  as  now,  hardly  averaged  50,  with  rarely  more  than  a 
quorum,  the  meaning  of  this  "safeguard"  becomes  plain. 

5.  A  vital  omission  of  the  rule  was  its  failure  to  include 
the  various  resolutions  which  go  to  the  Committee  on  Rules. 
That  body,  with  all  its  arbitrary  authority  over  changes  in  the 
rules,  special  rules.  Congressional  investigations,  etc.,  was 
left  ''a  law  unto  itself."  The  House  was  not  then  given,  nor 
has  it  since  been  given,  any  power  over  the  rules  committee. 

Such  was  the  rule  originally  provided  to  give  the  House 
some  measure  of  control  over  its  committees.  It  never  was 
workable.  Note  how  it  was  subsequently  "improved,"  from 
the  politicians'  point  of  view. 

On  February  3,  1912,  Robert  L.  Henry,  of  Texas,  Demo- 
cratic chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Rules,  presented  a  com- 
mittee amendment  to  this  rule.  This  amendment  did  not 
disturb  any  of  the  original  "safeguards."  It  added  another, 
providing  that  the  Calendar  of  Motions  to  Discharge  Com- 
mittees could  not  be  reached  until  after  both  the  Unanimous 
Consent  Calendar  and  Motions  to  Suspend  the  Rules  had  been 
exhausted.  These  are  rarely  if  ever  finished.  As  first  adopted 
the  rule  placed  this  vitally  important  calendar  behind  only  one 
other  order  of  business  on  the  two  Mondays  of  each  month 
when  it  could  be  reached.  This  later  change  gave  precedence 
to  still  another  filibustering  device — motions  to  suspend  the 
rules. 

This  last  rules  committee  amendment,  which  was  adopted 
by  a  vote  of  157  to  103,  made  the  possibility  of  reaching  the 
discharge  calendar  so  remote  that  nothing  short  of  a  miracle 
could  have  brought  about  its  use.  But  still  the  leaders  seemed 
fearful  that  the  tranquillity  of  their  organization  might  be 
disturbed  by  the  exercise  of  control  over  some  committees  by 
the  House  itself.    Accordingly,  more  "safeguarding"  was  done. 


90  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Inspect  the  last  House  calendar  of  the  Sixty-third  Congress, 
that  of  March  3,  1915,  and  you  will  discover,  in  the  depart- 
ment devoted  to  **Calendar  of  Motions  to  Discharge  Confi- 
mittees,"  that  sixty-eight  motions  were  filed.  Forty  of  these 
motions  were  filed  December  1,  1913 ;  twenty-one  on  the  day 
following,  and  two  on  the  next  day,  December  3.  After  thus 
"choking  the  calendar,"  this  activity  suddenly  ceased. 

Another  significant  fact  is  that  all  the  first  sixty-three 
motions  to  discharge  committees  were  made  by  Republicans — 
regular  organization  Republicans — irrefutable  evidence  of  the 
bi-partisan  character  of  the  House  machine. 

A  further  significant  fact  is  that  for  the  most  part  these 
motions  were  filed  in  pairs — twenty-four  regular  Republicans 
filing  forty-eight  motions.  (The  rule  provides  that  no  member 
shall  have  pending  on  this  calendar  more  than  two  motions.) 

On  the  face  of  the  record,  only  ten  of  these  motions  appear 
to  have  been  filed  in  good  faith.  The  other  motions  pertain 
to  comparatively  unimportant  bills,  not  introduced  by  the  mem- 
bers asking  that  they  be  withdrawn  from  the  committees  to 
which  they  had  been  referred. 

It  is  only  fair  to  infer  that  this  was  a  concerted  move  to 
create  an  immovable  "log- jam"  on  this  calendar.  Under  the 
rule,  motions  so  filed  have  to  be  considered  in  order.  That 
meant  that  not  even  a  miracle  could  have  cleared  the  way  for 
the  use  of  the  discharge  calendar  during  the  Sixty-third 
Congress. 

I  was  convinced  that  most  of  the  members  had  no  personal 
or  public  interest  in  filing  these  motions  to  discharge  commit- 
tees from  the  consideration  of  bills.  To  get  evidence  of  this 
important  "political"  fact,  the  following  letter  was  sent  to 
each  Congressman  who  had  done  so : 

My  Dear  Sir: 

The  record  shows  that  you  have  filed  two  motion  on  the  Calendar 
of  Motions  to  Discharge  Committees.  It  will  aid  the  National  Voters' 
League  in  its  study  of  the  parliarnentary  system  of  the  House,  if 
you  will  explain  the  practical  operation  of  this  device  for  discharging 
reluctant   committees.     We   are   especially   anxious    to  know    why   so 


YOUR  CONGRESS  91 

many  motions  were  filed  during  the  first  three  days  of  the  regular 
session,  with  no  subsequent  action. 
Thanking  you  for  this  assistance,  I  am, 

Very  truly. 

Only  a  few  answered.  Several  of  the  replies  were  evasive 
as  to  the  main  point.  But  a  few  did  contain  suggestions  that 
tended  to  confirm  my  belief.  For  example,  Allen  T.  Treadway, 
of  Massachusetts,  wrote : 

I  am  in  receipt  of  your  letter  relative  to  filing  motion  in  discharge 
committee.  I  beg  to  refer  you  to  Hon.  James  R.  Mann,  for  explana- 
tion of  that  parliamentary  procedure,  for  which  you  ask  information. 

Halvor  Steenerson,  of  Minnesota,  further  suggested  that 
the  choking  of  this  calendar  was  done  deliberately  and  in 
a  concerted  way.    His  letter  said: 

Replying  to  your  favor  of  the  thirteenth  instant  I  would  say  that 
I  signed  the  two  motions  to  discharge  committees,  as  far  as  I  now 
can  recollect,  at  the  request  of  one  of  the  Minority  employes  of  the 
House,  made  on  behalf  of  a  member. 

Samuel  Winslow,  of  Massachusetts,  disclaimed  his  own  lack 
of  interest  in  the  following : 

My  recollection  is  not  clear  about  the  motion  to  discharge  H.  R. 
3388,  excepting  that  I  am  quite  sure  that  some  other  member  who  was 
particularly  interested  in  obtaining  action  on  this  bill  requested  me  to 
assist  him  by  making  the  motion  to  discharge." 

Other  letters,  of  a  nature  too  personal  to  be  quoted,  were 
more  positive  in  their  assertion  as  to  this  manipulation,  and 
the  responsibility  for  it. 

None  of  these  motions  were  ever  acted  upon.  That  is  abso- 
lute proof  that  the  rule  was  unworkable.  The  point  that  you 
should  consider  most  seriously,  however,  is  the  obvious  fact 
that  it  was  never  intended  to  be  workable.  If,  by  any  remote 
chance,  the  "leaders"  who  conceived  this  Calendar  of  Motions 
to  Discharge  Committees  thought  that  it  might  work,  it  would 
be  an  admission  of  their  ignorance  concerning  the  meaning 
of  the  simplest  words  as  indicative  of  unfitness  for  public 
service  as  would  be  a  confession  that  they  had  deliberately 
tricked  the  people. 


92  YOUR  CONGRESS 

In  the  last  Congress,  therefore,  each  standing  committee  was 
as  supremely  "a  law  unto  itself"  as  during  the  best  days  of 
Cannonism.  The  result  was  a  combination  of  undisturbable 
forces  which  made  up  the  "organization." 

Tut  RuLKs  Committee: 

The  power  to  obstruct  legislation  is  also  the  power  to  legis- 
late. There  is  now  in  the  House  practically  no  such  thing 
as  regular,  orderly  procedure.  If  there  is  opposition  to  a 
measure,  even  from  the  smallest  possible  minority,  if  a  bill 
cannot  be  passed  under  "suspension  of  the  rules"  or  by  "unani- 
mous consent,"  it  means  that  it  must  be  made  "privileged"  to 
get  consideration.  Appropriation  bills  and  bills  coming  from 
the  Ways  and  Means  Committee  are  privileged  under  the 
rules.  Otherwise,  if  a  measure  is  to  be  given  the  right  of 
way,  it  must  be  done  through  a  special  rule  reported  by  the 
Committee  on  Rules.  All  reports  from  the  Committee  on  Rules 
are  "privileged"  and  can  be  taken  up  at  any  time.  This  unlim- 
ited, uncontrolled  power  makes  the  rules  committee  almost  the 
absolute  dictator  o^f  what  the  House  does  and  does  not  do. 

It  should  be  kept  in  mind  that  the  Committee  on  Rules  is 
absolute  in  its  field.  The  rules  give  to  the  House  no  authority 
over  this  subsidiary  body.  Even  the  over-jokered  discharge 
calendar  does  not  apply  to  this  committee.  The  rules  com- 
mittee is  almost  as  independent  of  the  House  as  though  it  did 
not  pertain  to  Congress.  I  know  that  such  a  statement  seems 
utterly  unbelievable,  but  it  is  literally  true.  There  is  no  offi- 
cial way  for  a  majority  of  the  membership  to  control  this  com- 
mittee. Only  the  little  oligarchy  of  leaders  who  make  up  the 
Committee  on  Rules  have  any  influence  upon  the  exercise  of 
its  arbitrary  powers,  and  such  influence  is  wholly  dark  and 
undemocratic. 

The  powers  of  the  Committee  on  Rules  He  in  three  fields: 
(1)  It  makes  and  controls  changes  in  the  rules;  (3)  it  has 
jurisdiction  over  resolutions  for  Congressional  investigations. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  98 

and  (3)  it  can  at  any  time  report  special  rules  to  give  prece- 
dence to  certain  measures. 

Readoption  o^  the;  Old  Ruizes 

The  "unofficial,"  preliminary  organizing  of  the  House  for 
the  next  Congress  has  already  been  discussed.  This  unauthor- 
ized organizing  must  be  made  official.  The  old  guard  must 
bring  about  the  readoption  of  the  old  rules,  which  is  all  that 
remains  to  be  done — of  the  machine  building — from  their 
point  of  view. 

All  hinges  upon  the  first  day's  session  of  the  new  Congress, 
when  the  rules  are  presented  for  the  approval  of  the  House. 
Once  the  old  rules  are  readopted  the  Committee  on  Rules  will 
again  be  in  supreme  control  of  the  whole  parliamentary  situa- 
tion. Every  proposal  for  a  change  in  the  rules  goes  auto- 
matically to  that  committee,  and  then,  if  all  other  Congressmen 
were  to  unite  in  a  demand  that  that  committee  report  rules 
reform  proposals  back  to  the  House  there  would  be  no  official 
way  to  enforce  the  demand. 

The  history  of  the  rules  committee  in  the  Sixty-first  Congress 
illuminates  this  point.  When  the  last  Congress  was  organized 
officially  there  was  the  usual  demand  for  changes  in  the  rules. 
Several  vital  amendments  were  offered.  To  secure  the  readop- 
tion of  the  old  rules  at  that  critical  time,  without  these  changes, 
Chairman  Robert  L.  Henry,  of  the  Committee  on  Rules,  then 
made  a  definite  promise  that  rules  reform  would  be  subse- 
quently considered.    He  said: 

Mr.  Speaker,  the  gentleman  from  Texas  (himself)  will  say  this, 
that  if  Members  desire  to  introduce  amendments  to  every  rule  of  this 
House,  and  those  amendments  are  referred  to  the  Committee  on  Rules, 
they  will  there  be  carefully  and  deliberately  considered,  with  an  abun- 
dance of  time  for  each  member  to  present  his  views  if  he  wishes  to 
appear,  and  then  the  Committee  on  Rules  will  present  a  report  to 
this  House  for  its  action,  to  adopt  if  it  wishes  to  do  so,  or  to  vote  it 
down  if  it  desires  to  do  so. 

What  resulted  from  this  promise?  Nothing.  During  the 
Sixty-third  Congress,  after  this  assurance  that  the  Committee 


94  YOUR  CONGRESS 

on  Rules  would  play  fair  with  the  independent,  anti-machine 
members,  and  that  it  could  be  depended  upon  to  do  what  the 
House  had  no  power  to  compel,  sixty-eight  different  amend- 
ments to  the  rules  were  introduced.  Congress  closed  with 
sixty-seven  of  them  still  buried  in  the  rules  committee.  The 
only  proposal  acted  upon  was  one  offered  by  Mr.  Henry  him- 
self (H.  R.  No.  104),  which  involved  only  the  creation  of  a 
new  standing  committee  on  roads. 

That  tells  the  whole  story  of  its  arbitrary  power  over 
changes  in  the  rules  and  of  what  may  reasonably  be  expected 
from  the  voluntary  action  of  the  Committee  on  Rules  in  the 
matter  of  rules  reform. 

Changes  in  the  rules  must  be  made,  or  at  least  an  oppor- 
tunity for  subsequent  changes  provided,  at  the  opening  of  the 
new  Congress.  Otherwise  the  old  order  will  continue.  The 
old  order  means,  on  the  obstructive  side,  general  rules  and 
parliamentary  conditions  which  multiply  obstruction  and  con- 
gestion of  business  indefinitely;  and  on  the  "constructive" 
side,  when  action  is  desired  by  those  in  control,  the  power  to 
nullify  and  override  all  rules  by  the  "organization,"  acting 
through  the  Committee  on  Rules. 

Other  Powers  o^  Rules  Committee 

Likewise  resolutions  for  Congressional  investigations  go 
automatically  to  the  Committee  on  Rules.  That  body  may  re- 
port them  back  to  the  House,  or  not,  as  it  chooses.  In  the  last 
Congress,  this  committee  had  referred  to  it  eighty  investigative 
resolutions,  among  them  being  the  Mulhall-McDermott  matter 
and  the  Calumet-Colorado  strike  situations. 

The  fullest  expression  of  the  influence  of  the  Committee  on 
Rules  lies  in  its  responsibility  for  the  vicious  parliamentary  sys- 
tem— in  its  failure  either  to  initiate  or  to  permit  opportunities 
for  forward  changes  in  the  rules.  But  almost  equally  undemo- 
cratic is  its  sponsorship  of  gag  rules,  its  uncontrolled  control 
over  the  procedure  of  the  House.  In  the  last  Congress  this 
committee  reported  sixty-two  special  rules,  giving  precedence 


YOUR  CONGRESS  95 

to  certain  measures,  limiting  debate  to  almost  no  discussion, 
and  shutting  off  amendments.  Through  this  reprehensible 
practice — 

On  February  i6,  1915,  the  House  "passed"  a  most  important 
measure,  all  in  one  day,  without  even  the  formality  of  having  it 
introduced  regularly  into  that  body. 

At  about  9  o'clock  the  previous  evening  a  new  ship  purchase 
bill  was  presented  to  the  Democratic  caucus  of  the  House. 
There  was  a  lot  of  "stand  by  the  organization,"  of  "be  regu- 
lar or  you  will  return  to  another  sixteen  years  of  wandering  in 
the  wilderness,  without  political  pie  and  pork,"  talk.  Then  this 
unofficial,  closed  caucus  "passed"  the  measure. 

The  following  morning  the  members  of  the  Committee  on 
Rules  were  hurriedly  assembled.  The  result  was  a  special 
gag  rule  of  almost  unprecedented  scope.  This  gag  rule  not 
only  provided  that  the  measure  should  have  immediate  "con- 
sideration" by  the  House,  with  six  hours  of  "debate,"  hut  also 
virtually  introduced  the  measure  and  prescribed  the  exact  and 
only  form  in  which  it  should  "pass." 

At  11  o'clock  the  same  morning  the  Rules  Committee  jour- 
neyed to  the  House  with  this  most  extraordinary  gag  rule 
and  before  the  adjournment  of  that  day's  session  the  farce 
had  been  completed  by  the  "passage"  of  the  measure. 

The  lower  branch  of  Congress  has  descended  to  the  "shoes 
soled-while-you-wait"  level  in  legislation.  It  is  all  done  by  a 
few  leaders,  with  a  machine  so  well  organized,  so  perfectly 
controlled,  that  some  political  king  or  kaiser  need  do  little  more 
than  press  a  button.  To  maintain  a  shallow  pretense  of  de- 
liberation, and  to  afford  opportunity  for  a  sham  battle  of  pattir 
san  oratory,  those  in_command  of  the  House  organization 
arrange  in  the  special  gag  rule  for  a  few  hours  of  "_delia.te/' 
But  no  new  amendments  are  permitted.  No  deviation  from 
the  prescribed  program  is  possible.  It  is  all  a  farce.  The 
Committee  on  Rules  contributes  the  biggest,  most  essential 
element  to  such  farcical  proceedings. 


96  YOUR  CONGRESS 

There  is  another  side  to  the  gag  rule  powers  of  this  com- 
mittee. It  may  at  any  time  bring  "buffers"  before  the  House. 
Special  consideration  may  be  given  "time  killers" — ^bills  which 
are  given  the  right  of  way  because  the  organization  wishes  to 
sidetrack  politically  dangerous  questions.  That  is  why  an  un- 
important measure  often  receives  a  hundred  times  more  and 
truer  deliberation  than  one  in  which  the  politics  of  members 
and  the  interests  of  the  public  are  involved. 

When  they  wish  quick  action  on  some  politically  dangerous 
question,  there  is  only  the  pretense  of  deliberation.  The 
organization  can  "pass"  a  bill  in  a  day. 

In  this  connection,  a  difference  between  Cannonism  and  the 
Underwood-Cannon-Aldrich  system  should  be  noted.  Can- 
non's machine  was  a  model  on  the  obstructive  side:  the  new 
regime  is  not  only  perfect  in  that  respect,  but  it  can  "legislate" 
along  boss  lines  as  well.  Through  the  further  abortion  of  the 
"discharge  calendar,"  it  has  even  improved  the  obstructive 
phases  of  Cannonism.  Its  boss-controlled  devices  for  "pass- 
ing" measures — chiefly  the  caucus  and  rules  committee — make 
old  masters  like  Cannon  and  Aldrich  appear  amateurish. 

The  Individuai,  Member 

Having  seen  something  of  how  the  House  is  organized  and 
controlled,  with  a  view  of  the  caucus  and  Committee  on  Rules 
at  work,  let  us  now  follow  a  measure  through  the  machinery 
of  legislation. 

First,  the  bill  is  introduced.  A  measure  may  come  from  a 
committee,  but  it  is  usually  presented  by  some  member.  The 
individual  member  has  full  freedom  to  introduce  bills.  There 
his  representative  powers  practically  end.  The  machine  takes 
his  measure.  He  has  no  influence  over  it  at  any  subsequent 
stage.  He  cannot  advance  it;  only  the  caucus  or  a  committee 
may  do  that.  If  the  committee  having  it  in  charge  should 
voluntarily  report  it  to  the  House,  that  would  be  no  guarantee 
of  its  further  consideration.  The  general  log  jam  might  engulf 
it ;  a  privileged  measure  might  get  in  its  way ;  or  the  rules  com- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  97 

mittee  might  interfere  by  placing  some  ''buffer"  ahead  of  it. 
Neither  its  author,  nor  any  other  individual  member,  not  even 
a  majority  of  individual  members,  have  any  real  deliberative 
functions.  They  cannot  advance,  debate  or  amend  a  measure 
unless  the  ''leaders"  desire  it  and  condescend  to  give  the  op- 
portunity. 

There  are  435  members  in  the  House.  Of  this  number  fully 
four  hundred  are  figureheads.  That  accounts  for  many  of  the 
duplicities  of  Congressional  politics.  These  dummy  members, 
made  so  by  the  system,  are  compelled  by  the  exigencies  of  poli- 
tics to  practice  every  possible  deception  to  keep  their  constitu- 
ents from  the  realization  that  they  are  nonentities  in  Congress. 
Denied  all  opportunty  to  serve  the  public  in  legitimate  ways, 
they  are  forced  to  play  politics  in  order  to  survive.  Accord- 
ingly they  study  politics  rather  than  public  service.  Hundreds 
of  times  do  Congressmen  investigate  the  political  significances 
of  a  question,  where  there  is  but  a  single  inquiry  into  its  moral 
or  economic  aspects.  The  system  has  made  Congress  a  school 
wherein  is  taught  the  science  of  seeming. 

Public  service  is  out  of  the  question  for  the  average  indi- 
vidual member.  Numerically  he  is  one  of  the  435,  but  in  in- 
fluence and  power  a  few  "leaders"  are  the  435.  Denied  his 
legitimate  rights  as  a  legislator,  the  politics  of  Congressional 
life  is  all  that  remains  open  to  him.  How  does  he  take  ad- 
vantage of  these  political  opportunities? 

1.  The  pork  barrel  is  open.  The  "leaders"  keep  it  open. 
Pork  is  one  of  his  rewards  for  servility  to  their  system.  How- 
ever much  a  nonentity  he  may  be,  so  long  as  he  does  not  "in- 
surge,"  the  average  member  is  permitted  to  reach  into  the 
pork  barrel  for  whatever  will  be  of  political  advantage  to  him 
with  influential  classes  and  communities  at  home.  That  is  a 
standing  reward  for  regularity. 

2.  Patronage  is  the  same.  He  is  given  every  possible  oppor- 
tunity to  build  a  personal  machine  in  his  district,  so  long  as 
he  remains  a  regular  and  makes  no  trouble  for  the  political 
powers  that  be. 


98  YOUR  CONGRESS 

3.  Such  petty  Congressional  trash  as  free  seeds  becomes 
important.  Every  recipient  of  free  seeds  should  understand 
that  in  ninety-nine  of  a  hundred  cases  the  sender  is  only  court- 
ing political  favor.    Votes,  not  vegetables,  is  what  he  is  after. 

4.  Even  Government  documents  are  prostituted  to  political 
purposes.  When  a  document  is  printed,  each  Congressman  is 
entitled  to  his  quota.  A  certain  publication  may  be  of  political 
value  in  one  district  and  not  in  another.  In  such  cases  Mem- 
bers may  trade,  each  getting  extra  copies  with  which  to  remind 
his  voting  constituents  that  he  is  not  forgetful  of  their  par- 
ticular interests. 

5.  The  same  political  necessities  are  responsible  for  the 
grossest  abuse  of  the  leave-to-print  privilege.  All  manner  of 
things  which  can  be  disseminated  back  home — at  public  ex- 
pense— are  put  into  the  record.  In  most  campaigns  the  people 
pay  for  their  own  deception  in  this  way.  I  recall  one  "cam- 
paign" speech  in  Congress  which  was  reprinted  by  other  Mem- 
bers, as  their  own,  and  franked  broadcast  to  the  voters  of  their 
districts. 

6.  Akin*  to  this  is  the  franking  privilege,  through  which  the 
average  member  can — at  public  expense — keep  in  touch  with 
and  appear  to  be  doing  something  for  almost  every  individual 
voter  in  his  district. 

7.  The  purely  personal  side  of  the  individual  member  situ- 
ation is  even  more  perverted.  The  mileage  graft  has  already 
been  considered.  The  stationery  allowance  illustrates  the  same 
petty  mercenary  element.  Each  member  is  given  $125  for 
stationery  each  session.  This  may  be  drawn  in  cash,  or  left 
to  ke  drawn  against  in  stationery.  Most  members  draw  it  all 
in  cash.  And  there  is  no  record  in  such  cases  to  show  whether 
or  not  any  of  it  w^  ever  paid  out  for  stationery.  All  Con- 
gressmen are  members  of  committees.  At  the  beginning  of 
a  Congress  standing  committees  get  through  a  kind  of  blanket 
resolution  authorizing  at  public  expense  such  printing  as  may 
be  "necessary."  This  is  interpreted  to  authorize  the  printing 
of  stationery,  which  is   furnished  to  members.     When  you 


YOUR  CONGRESS  99 

receive  a  letter  from  your  Congressman,  the  chances  are  100 
to  1  that  it  will  be  written,  not  on  letterheads  for  which  he 
has  paid  out  of  his  allowance  for  that  purpose,  but  on  the 
stationery  of  the  committee  of  which  he  is  a  member.  That 
probably  means  that  all  or  a  part  of  the  stationery  allowance 
has  gone  into  his  pocket.  This  small  plunder  is  another  of  the 
fruits  of  the  system. 

A  far  more  serious  misappropriation,  at  least  misapplica- 
tion of  public  money,  is  found  in  the  clerk  hire  allowance. 
Each  member  is  given  $125  a  month  with  which  to  pay  his 
secretary.  The  law  on  this  subject  was  so  jokered  that  this 
money  does  not  go  directly  to  the  employes,  as  it  should ;  they 
are  on  no  salary  rolls.  It  is  paid  to  individual  Congressmen  to 
do  with  as  they  choose.  There  is  no  public  record  in  this 
connection,  and  it  is  impossible  to  identify  the  offenders.  But 
it  is  known  that  three  different  possibilities  for  misappropri- 
ation exist:  (a)  if  a  member  is  chairman  of  a  committee  he 
may  use  the  committee  clerks  for  his  own  personal  political 
business  and  pocket  all  of  the  clerk  hire  allowance;  (b)  a 
member  may  employ  a  stenographer,  for  part  or  full  time,  at 
a  less  salary  than  he  is  expected  to  pay,  and  pocket  the  dif- 
ference; and  (c)  two  or  more  members  may  join  in  the  use  of 
a  single  fifty-dollars-a-month  stenographer  and  pocket  a  still 
greater  difference. 

8.  One  of  the  big  fundamental  difficulties  in  national  legis- 
lation has  developed  naturally  out  of  the  general  disfranchise- 
ment and  nonentitizing  of  members.  That  is  the  tendency 
toward  private  rather  than  public  bills,  and  a  resulting  conges- 
tion of  business.  The  individual  member  is  not  a  public 
servant,  however  much  he  may  pose  and  play  in  that  role. 
The  system  has  reduced  him  to  the  status  of  an  errand  boy,  a 
pettifogging  attorney,  for  this,  that  and  the  other  interest  in 
his  district.  It  makes  no  difference  whether  these  local  inter- 
ests be  legitimate  or  not.  He  must  at  least  appear  to  be  doing 
something  for  the  greatest  possible  number  of   people  and 


100  YOUR  CONGRESS 

groups  of  people  among  the  voters  upon  whose  favor  he  has 
to  depend  for  re-election.    This  necessity  leads  to — 

(a)  A  constantly  increasing  number  of  "private"  bills, 
many  of  which  have  to  be  enacted  to  keep  their  authors  servile 
and  the  system  intact.  This  means  in  Congress  an  ever-increas- 
ing tendency  to  give  time  and  attention  to  petty  private  and 
local  matters,  rather  than  questions  in  which  the  general  pub- 
lic is  concerned.  It  means  a  hopeless  congestion  of  business, 
a  condition  which  aids  the  "leaders"  in  their  control  of  the 
machine. 

(b)  The  introduction  of  thousands  and  thousands  of  "po- 
litical" bills,  measures  which  the  authors  know  will  never 
progress  beyond  the  point  of  introduction,  measures  which 
they  never  intend  to  push  beyond  that  stage.  But  the  mere 
introduction  of  them  serves  a  campaign  purpose.  When  intro- 
duced they  are  printed  and  may  be  franked  to  those  individuals 
or  communities  specially  interested.  Being  ignorant  of  con- 
ditions, or  too  far  away  to  get  light,  the  small,  selfishly  inter- 
ested part  of  the  public  to  whom  they  are  sent  immediately  con- 
clude that  their  member  is  busy  and  influential  in  their  behalf. 

The  average  member,  therefore,  reduced  by  the  system  to 
the  importance  of  a  rubber  stamp,  is  thereby  forced  to  depend 
upon  essentially  selfish  and  corrupting  practices  for  his  stand- 
ing with  constituents.  The  only  course  open  to  him  is  to 
convert  into  political  capital  the  last  available  bit  of  pork  and 
plunder;  to  cater  to  local  interests  and  ambitions;  to  take  the 
fullest  advantage  of  the  franking  privilege,  of  free  seeds  and 
free  advertising.  A  serving  man  for  the  machine,  he  must 
subsist  largely  on  tips.  These  tips — public  buildings,  local 
improvements,  pensions,  private  claims,  and  various  kind^  of 
patronage — the  system  enhances  into  inflated  political  values.. 

The  Standing  Committee 

After  a  bill  has  been  introduced  it  goes  automatically  to  the 
committee  which  the  rules  give  jurisdiction  over  its  subject 


YOUR  CONGRESS  101 

matter.  The  standing  committee  is  the  real  basis  of  the  con- 
gressional machine. 

There  are  fifty-eight  standing  committees,  fully  twice  as 
many  as  are  needed.  The  unnecessary  number  only  contributes 
to  the  bad  politics  of  the  situation.  At  present  the  House  has 
such  committees  as  these:  a  Committee  on  the  Disposition  of 
Useless  Papers;  three  different  Committees  on  Elections; 
eleven  different  Committees  on  Expenditures,  and  a  Committee 
on  Mileage — a  wholly  useless  body,  because  its  duties  are  arbi- 
trarily defined  by  "law"  and  would  take  less  than  a  week  of 
work  by  an  ordinary  clerk.  All  the  needless  committees  are 
very  essential  to  the  existing  boss  system  for  two  reasons: 
(1)  Each  carries  with  it  a  chairmanship  and  certain  perquis- 
ites; these  positions  and  perquisites  of  the  lesser  committees, 
together  with  chairmanships  and  positions  on  the  more  impor- 
tant committees,  particularly  the  pork  barrel  committees,  are 
the  subtle  briberies  by  which  the  organization  is  built  and  held 
together.  (2)  These  useless  committees  are  used  further  by 
the  leaders  as  burial  places  for  those  members  of  all  parties 
who  are  independent  and  likely  to  make  trouble  for  the  system. 

It  has  been  shown  how  these  committees  are  beyond  the 
control  of  a  majority.  Once  organized,  the  foundation  forces 
of  the  boss-controlled  machine  are  thus  undisturbable. 

Most  important  among  these  standing  committees,  as  has 
already  been  demonstrated,  are  the  Ways  and  Means  Com- 
mittee, which,  in  addition  to  "privileged"  jurisdiction  over 
revenue  measures,  does  the  organizing  of  the  machine;  and 
the  Committee  on  Rules,  which  sponsors  and  protects  the 
reactionary  rules,  and  acts  as  the  steering  committee  of  the 
machine.  The  twelve  different  committees  dealing  with  appro- 
priations virtually  complete  the  system.  These  preside  over 
the  political  rewards  or  punishments  of  the  pork  barrel.  I 
have  studied  dozens  of  crucial  roll  calls :  in  95  per  cent  of 
them  the  membership  of  the  appropriations  committees,  both 
Democratic  and  Republican,  have  stood  almost  solidly  for  what- 
ever the  "organization"  wanted. 


102  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Controlling  both  the  personnel  and  procedure  of  standing 
committees,  it  is  only  natural  that  the  organization  leaders 
should  be  able  to  keep  the  membership  subjected  and  submis- 
sive. For  decades,  throughout  American  legislative  institu- 
tions, from  Congress  down  to  municipal  machines,  good  com- 
mittee places  have  been  held  superior  to  all  else  in  that  field. 
The  average  member  has  been  made  to  feel  that  prominence 
on  a  committee  is  everything — opportunity,  prestige,  power. 
It  is  because  of  this  mental  attitude  that  the  bosses  who  control 
the  organization  of  committees  are  able  to  control  the  mem- 
bership. Measured  by  the  standard  of  a  century,  they  possess 
the  most  potent  weapons  through  which  to  control:  they  can 
reward  those  who  are  faithful  by  giving  them  favored  places 
in  the  organization;  or  they  may  punish  those  who  insurge 
by  withholding  positions  with  "perquisites"  and  ''influence." 

The  chairmanship  of  a  standing  committee  is  the  chief 
"plunder."  To  be  the  chairman  of  a  committee  is  the  ambition 
of  the  average  member.  That  position  on  the  more  important 
committees  means  political  power  and  prestige;  in  all  cases 
it  means  perquisites  of  a  substantial  kind — committee  clerks, 
a  committee  room,  printing  privileges,  etc.  As  has  been  sug- 
gested, the  extra  clerk  or  clerks  may  enable  the  committee 
chairman  to  pocket  his  clerk  hire  allowance ;  in  any  event  this 
means  additional  political  work  for  the  chairman,  for  which 
the  public  pays. 

Seniority  also  contributes  here  to  the  general  submission. 
Members  usually  are  reappointed  to  the  same  committees. 
Congress  after  Congress,  and  advance  as  vacancies  occur. 
Therefore  the  special  reward  of  a  chairmanship  is  constantly 
ahead,  if  the  member  remains  "regular,"  and  does  nothing  to 
incur  the  displeasure  of  the  organization.  This  influence  is 
poteiit,  even  with  the  minority  members.  With  them  the  "rank- 
ing place"  on  the  minority  side  will  mean  the  chairmanship 
when  their  party  returns  to  power. 

/^Standing  committees  keep  no  public  record  of  their  acts. 
With  only  two  or  three  exceptions,  they  keep  no  calendars. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  103 

At  present  there  is  chaos  in  this  direction.  Members  them- 
selves have  to  take  hours  and  days  if  they  want  to  investigate 
bills  along  any  certain  line.  In  its  work  the  National  Voters' 
League  has  been  compelled  to  make  up  from  the  proceedings 
day  by  day  a  calendar  for  each  of  the  fifty-eight  committees. 
And  then  there  was  no  way  to  discover  what  some  or  all  of 
these  committees  may  have  done  in  executive  sessions  with  the 
lights  out. 

A  bill,  then,  after  the  individual  has  performed-  his  only 
unrestricted  representative  function  of  introducing  it,  passes 
automatically  into  the  custody  of  a  standing  committee,  organ- 
ized "politically,"  subject  to  no  control  other  than  the  boss 
devices  of  the  congressional  machine,  meeting  in  darkness, 
with  no  public  record  of  its  proceedings,  and  not  even  a  calen- 
dar to  enable  the  public  to  comprehend  the  status  of  its 
business. 

Obstructively,  once  the  organization  has  packed  the  com- 
mittees, its  control  over  legislation  is  supreme.  The  majority 
is  wholly  without  power.  That  is  simple,  and  easily  under- 
stQjod.  The  more  complicated  part  comes  when  the  leaders 
desire  to  legislate.  To  pass  a  measure,  without  giving  the 
majority  the  smallest  opportunity  for  deliberation  is  indeed  a 
triumph  of  political  parliamentarism.  Let  us  see  how  that  is 
done. 

The  standing  committee  having  jurisdiction  reports  the  bill, 
in  the  form  in  which  the  organization  desires  it  to  pass.  What 
the  closed  caucus  or  the  rules  committee  may  do  in  this  con- 
nection has  been  outlined.  After  being  reported,  the  bill  is 
considered  in — 

The:  Committee:  of  the:  Whole 

No  parliamentary  institution,  save  only  the  conference  com- 
mittee, is  darker  or  more  devious  than  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole. 

The  Committee  of  the  Whole  is  the  House  itself  under  an 
assumed  name.    The  Constitution  provides  that  when  one-fifth 


104  YOUR  CONGRESS 

of  the  members  of  the  House  demand  an  aye  and  nay  vote, 
there  shall  be  a  roll  call  and  a  duly  recorded  vote.  Obviously 
to  get  around  that  provision  of  the  Constitution,  the  House 
assumes  a  different  name  and  calls  itself  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole.  The  rest  is  simple.  The  rules  provide  that  there 
shall  be  no  roll  calls  in  Committee  of  the  Whole.^^ 

As  was  illustrated  in  the  story  of  the  mileage  graft,  unless 
a  bill  is  amended  in  the  recordless  Committee  of  the  Whole, 
there  is  no  subsequent  opportunity  for  a  record  vote  on  various 
amendments.  If  the  organization  is  overthrown  in  the  Com- 
mittee of  the  Whole  (and  such  cases  occur  very  rarely),  then, 
upon  the  demand  of  the  constitutional  one-fifth,  the  amend- 
ment may  have  a  record  vote  when  the  measure  passes  into 
the  open  House. 

Practically  the  only  opportunities  for  "debate"  and  "delibera- 
tion" come  when  a  measure  is  in  Committee  of  the  Whole. 
And  these  "opportunities"  are  only  nominal  because  the  atti- 
tude of  members  cannot  be  made  a  matter  of  public  record. 
Where  there  is  no  record  vote,  the  average  member  will  stand 
by  the  organization.  That  was  true  all  through  the  alleged 
deliberation  on  the  tariff  and  currency  bills.  Not  a  single 
important  amendment  to  either  was  adopted  in  the  Committee 
of  the  Whole.  This  meant  that  members  had  to  vote  finally 
for  these  measures  as  a  whole,  that  they  had  been  denied  the 
right  to  vote  upon  the  various  questions  involved.  No  tariff 
schedule,  no  item  of  a  schedule,  not  even  the  income  tax  pro- 
vision of  that  bill,  could  be  voted  upon  excepting  in  the  meas- 
ure as  a  whole. 

The  organization  has  the  power  to  determine  just  what  the 
House  shall  consider;  and  through  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole  the  leaders  can  prescribe  the  exact  and  only  form  in 
which  a  measure  shall  be  considered.  There  is  no  deliberation 
that  can  in  the  remotest  way  affect  legislation.     The  indul- 

»  The  Senate  has  roll  calls  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole.  The  difference  between  the 
Senate  and  House  in  this  respect  is  illustrated  by  the  fact  that  there  were  118  roll  calls  on 
the  tariff  bill  in  the  Senate  as  against  only  3  in  the  House. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  105 

gence  in  debate,  the  offering  of  amendments,  are  only  for  politi- 
cal effect. 

When  the  House  assumes  its  alias,  the  general  attitude  is 
a  confession  of  its  farcical  meaning.  It  is  a  kind  of  play  time. 
There  can  be  no  roll  calls  to  show  whether  or  not  members 
are  present.  The  speeches  more  often  than  not  pertain  to 
entirely  different  subjects,  most  of  them  of  campaign  charac- 
ter for  home  consumption.  The  members  only  show  human- 
ness  in  refusing  to  be  on  hand  and  listen.  Instead,  many  of 
them  go  to  ball  games,  or  enjoy  other  diversions.  Ordinarily, 
if  a  special  gag  rule  has  set  aside  ten  hours  for  "general  de- 
bate" on  a  measure  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole,  it  means 
that  members,  save  only  a  few  awaiting  opportunity  to  make 
political  speeches,  will  absent  themselves  for  that  time.  Fre- 
quently I  have  seen  less  than  a  dozen  in  the  House  chamber. 

The  Committee  of  the  Whole  is  only  a  contrivance  through 
which  politicians  carry  on  a  pretense  of  deliberation.  Its 
chief  purpose  is  to  evade  public  records.  It  is  the  House 
itself,  with  the  lights  out.  ^ 

The  Open  House  • 

After  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  has  "passed"  a  measure, 
it  is  taken  up  by  the  House  minus  its  alias.  If  the  constitu- 
tional one-fifth  demand  a  record  vote  on  its  final  passage,  there 
is  a  roll  call.  This  record  is  always  shorn  of  much  of  its 
meaning  by  the  controlled  and  darkened  processes  which  pre- 
ceded it.  As  has  been  explained,  the  leaders  are  able  not 
only  to  decide  what  the  House  shall  consider  but  also  the  exact 
and  only  form  in  which  measures  shall  finally  be  voted  upon. 

In  the  ordinary  course  of  machine  events  the  Committee 
of  the  Whole  refuses  to  adopt  any  amendments  to  a  measure. 
That  precludes  the  possibility  of  a  record  vote  upon  amend- 
ments; the  House  then  can  only  vote  upon  a  bill  as  a  whole. 

There  is,  however,  one  opportunity  to  force  a  record  vote 
in  addition  to  that  upon  the  final  passage  of  a  measure.  The 
rules  provide  at  this  stage  for  "a  motion  to  recommit"  a  bill 


106  YOUR  CONGRESS 

to  its  committee.  If  this  motion  is  made  in  good  faith,  it 
may  include  instructions  to  report  the  bill  back  with  an  amend- 
ment, upon  which  the  minority  desires  a  record  vote.  But 
the  bi-partisan  organization  is  able  to  control  even  this  pro- 
ceeding. Here  the  Speaker's  power  of  ''recognition"  and  prece- 
dents enter  to  safeguard  the  leaders.  The  motion  to  recommit 
is  a  privilege  given  to  the  minority.  The  only  one  of  the 
minority  usually  recognized  to  make  such  a  motion  is  the 
ranking  minority  member  of  the  committee  which  has  had  the 
bill  in  charge.  Here,  again,  you  get  the  importance  to  the 
politicians  of  a  "safe"  organization  of  the  standing  committees, 
even  on  the  minority  side.  To  illustrate,  when  the  House 
passed  the  "war  tax"  bill,  Sereno  Payne,  the  ranking  Repub- 
lican on  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee,  was  recognized  to 
make  the  usual  motion  to  recommit.  His  motion  was  a  per- 
fectly meaningless  one.  It  provided  merely  that  the  measure 
be  recommitted  to  that  committee,  providing  for  no  "instruc- 
tions" or  amendment  of  any  kind  upon  which  the  record  vote 
could  be  based. 

The  full  import  of  this  becomes  clear  when  you  remember 
that  the  Republicans  had  fairly  stormed  against  the  war  tax 
bill.  But  when  the  opportunity  came  to  do  something  more 
than  talk,  to  vote  upon  the  measure  in  a  form  which  would  give 
expression  to  the  minority  attitude,  they  did  nothing.  There 
can  be  no  more  conclusive  evidence  of  the  bi-partisan  harmony 
that  exists  among  Democratic  and  Republican  regulars,  nor 
of  the  importance  of  the  organization  to  both  sides. 

The  Conference  Committee 

The  politicians  have  still  another  chance.  Even  after  the 
closed  caucus,  and  controlled  committees,  and  lightless  Com- 
mittee of  the  Whole,  have  finished  with  a  bill,  and  it  has 
passed  the  House,  there  comes  the  worst  parliamentary  insti- 
tution of  all,  the  Conference  Committee. 

Almost  without  exception,  the  House  and  Senate  disagree 
on   public  measures.     Then   a   conference   committee   is   ap- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  107 

pointed  by  the  presiding  officers  of  the  two  branches,  to  recon- 
cile their  differences.  The  story  of  the  mileage  graft  has 
already  illustrated  the  manipulations  that  are  possible  by  this 
body. 

Precedent  decrees  that  the  '"conferees,"  usually  six  in  num- 
ber, shall  be  for  both  House  and  Senate  the  chairman  and 
ranking  majority  member  and  the  ranking  minority  member 
of  the  standing  committee  that  originally  had  jurisdiction  of 
the  bill.  Here,  again,  recurs  the  meaning  of  the  organization 
in  the  beginning.  The  organization  leaders  are  the  only  mem- 
bers with  a  real  opportunity  to  influence  legislation  at  any 
point. 

The  conference  committee  meets  in  darkness  and  keeps  no 
public  record  of  its  acts.  Its  reports  are  of  the  highest  privi- 
lege, and  cannot  be  amended.  It  is  the  culminating  feature 
of  a  parliamentary  system  that  is  unbelievably  dark  and  undem- 
ocratic. So  long  as  there  is  a  bi-cameral  Congress,  it  will  be 
next  to  impossible  to  eliminate  this  evil. 

RUI.KS  Reform  to  Date 

In  the  last  decade,  notwithstanding  insurgency  and  all  the 
efforts  at  rules  reform  represented  by  that  movement,  just  two 
noteworthy  parliamentary  changes  were  accomplished.  Both 
were  backward  steps.  These  were:  (1)  The  over-jokered 
Calendar  of  Motions  to  Discharge  Committees,  which  has  been 
discussed  in  detail,  and  (2)  Calendar  Wednesday.  The  dis- 
charge calendar  was  masked  as  a  contrivance  through  which 
the  majority  might  exercise  some  measure  of  control  over 
standing  committees.  Calendar  Wednesday  was  one  day  a 
week  in  which  nothing  was  supposed  to  interfere  with  the 
regular  business  of  the  House. 

The  discharge  calendar  was  wrong  in  principle  and  would 
have  proved  inadequate  in  practice,  even  had  it  been  workable. 
It  amounted  only  to  a  confession  that  the  House  was  organ- 
ized, not  to  do  business,  but  to  obstruct  business. 


108  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Calendar  Wednesday  was  an  equally  humiliating  admission 
that  there  was  no  such  thing  as  regular,  orderly,  routine  pro- 
cedure; that  the  House  could  not  act  tmless  some  special  means 
was  provided. 

Both  in  respect  to  organization  and  control,  conditions  in 
the  House  of  Representatives  were  far  more  undemocratic 
during  the  last  Congress  than  in  the  best  days  of  Cannonism. 
Why  has  rules  reform  failed?  Why  have  parliamentary  con- 
ditions gone  from  bad  to  worse? 

The  chief  reason  lies  in  the  fact  that  insurgency  never 
took  a  constructive  position,  nor  advanced  a  constructive  pro- 
gram. Even  during  the  crisis  of  the  revolt  against  Cannon, 
those  who  bore  the  brunt' of  the  attack  did  not  have  adequate 
remedies  to  propose.  They  were  an  energetic  wrecking  crew, 
but  with  apparently  no  vision  of  what  parliamentary  institu- 
tions should  replace  the  ones  they  sought  to  demolish.  Nor 
is  there  any  evidence  that  those  early  insurgents,  to  whom  the 
country  owes  so  much,  ever  even  took  a  survey  of  the  whole 
parliamentary  situation,  as  we  have  tried  to  do.  Perhaps 
they  were  too  close  to  the  system  to  comprehend  the  relative 
importance  of  the  various  institutions  and  instrumentalities 
that  entered  into  it.  They  fought  for  and  welcomed  both 
Calendar  Wednesday  and  the  discharge  calendar,  not  seeming 
to  realize  that  they  were  neither  adequate  nor  rightly  founded. 

The  two  steps,  the  only  two  that  the  public  can  take,  in 
parliamentary  reconstruction,  are  an  appraisal  of  conditions 
that  need  correction,  and  the  presentation  of  a  program  of 
remedies.  The  House  alone  has  the  opportunity  and  power 
to  build  a  new  system.  We  have,  I  think,  seen  enough  of 
existing  conditions  to  comprehend  wherein  they  should  be 
changed.  The  question  concerns  the  changes  that  should  be 
made,  which  is  considered  in  the  next  chapter.  To  present  to 
Congress  a  constructive  program  of  rules  reform  will  mark 
the  entry  of  an  entirely  new  element,  an  influence  that  the 
bosses  have  never  had  to  confront. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  109 

It  should  be  kept  in  mind  that  the  one  great  evil  to  be 
corrected  is  perverted  politics.  The  parliamentary  system  of 
Congress  is  its  chief  corner-stone.  Bossism,  seniority,  minority 
rule,  patronage,  the  pork  barrel,  partyism,  the  complete  lack 
of  publicity,  and  all  the  other  elements  are  only  manifesta- 
tions of  the  end-in-itself  political  system. 


WHERE  CREDIT  IS  DUE 

''Congress  should  attend  to  that,'^  said  a  friend  upon  learning 
that  I  intended  to  present  the  principles  of  a  constructive  program 
of  rules  reform.  ''Why  not  let  the  House  work  out  that  probleml 
Are  not  members  themselves  in  the  best  position  to  know  what 
should  be  done  about  the  things  of  which  you  complain!"  One  of 
my  earliest  investigations  was  for  light  upon  that  point. 

In  recent  years  I  have  interviewed  practically  every  congressman 
who  manifested  a  disposition  toward  rules  reform.  Not  more  than 
three  have  shown  a  comprehensive  grasp  of  the  problems  involved, 
nor  of  the  remedies  necessary  to  change  conditions.  The  eager, 
hopeful  way  in  which  the  insurgents  accepted  Calendar  Wednesday 
and  the  Calendar  of  Motions  to  Discharge  Committees  illustrates 
their  general  attitude. 

When  a  number  were  asked  to  state  specifically  what  should  be 
done  to  make  Congress  deliberative  and  democratic,  without  excep- 
tion everyone,  now  admitting  its  complete  failure,  urged  schemes 
to  make  the  "discharge  calendar"  workable.  Not  one  of  them 
saw  what  seems  almost  obvious,  that  there  is  no  necessity  for  a 
discharge  calendar,  that  the  only  remedy  needed  in  that  direction 
is  a  simple  rule  requiring  every  standing  committee  to  report  back 
to  the  House  all  business  given  into  its  hands. 

Others  recommended  that  there  be  provided  more  opportunities 
for  "special  orders."  That,  too,  seems  obviously  absurd— like 
trying  to  cure  an  inebriate  with  more  and  more  whiskey.  One 
of  the  basic  difficulties  in  the  House  now  is  that  regular,  orderly 
business  hardly  exists.  Routine  procedure  should  be  the  rule  and 
not  the  exception.  How  long  could  your  business  endure  if  it 
were  conducted  on  the  principle  of  "special  orders,"  if  there  were 
no  regular  routine  about  it,  if  you  had  to  make  extraordinary  pro- 
vision for  everything  you  desired  to  dol  That  is  the  situation  in 
Congress.  Regular,  orderly,  routine  procedure  is  almost  unknown. 
Yet  the  best  intentioned  members,  so  bewildering  is  the  system 
when  seen  at  close  range,  solemnly  propose  still  more  "gag  rules" 
as  a  means  of  getting  public  business  done. 

110 


YOUR  CONGRESS  111 

/  cite  these  things  to  show  that  Congress  itself  would  not  be  likely, 
in  a  century,  to  initiate  adequate  parliamentary  reform.  A 
program  of  constructive  changes  must  be  conceived  by  citizens  on 
the  outside,  disinterested  people  who  have  stood  apart  from  the 
turmoil  and  surveyed  the  situation  from  every  side.  And  then 
only  the  uncompromising  demand  of  many  people,  expressed  in 
what  we  call  public  opinion,  will  compel  the  leaders  to  act,  although 
a  majority  in  Congress  would  welcome  emancipation. 

In  preparing  the  following  outline  of  parliamentary  recon- 
struction, I  have  had  little  help  from  public  men.  But  from 
people  on  the  outside,  citizens  here  and  there  throughout  the  coun- 
try, I  have  received  so  much  assistance  that  the  remedies  proposed 
are  more  theirs  than  mine.  My  task  has  been  largely  one  of 
compilation  and  correlation. 

The  Executive  Committee  of  the  National  Voters  League  has 
been  of  the  greatest  help.  Five  of  these,  Elizabeth  G.  Evans,  Alice 
G.  Brandeis,  C.  H.  Ingersoll,  Lieutenant  C.  P.  Shaw  and  Stiles 
P  Jones,  have  given  generously  of  their  time  and  talents. 

There  is  in  Washington  a  fine  group  of  young  men  known  as 
the  H.  R's.     To  this  group  I  am  under  special  obligation. 

Among  others  whose  aid  has  been  invaluable  are  Dr.  C.  F. 
Taylor,  C.  G.  Hoag,  F.  F.  Anderson,  Frederick  M.  Kerby, 
Julian  Leavitt,  Basil  M.  Manly,  Laurence  Todd,  W.  L.  Stod- 
dard, Harry  A.  Slattery  and  Gilson  Gardner.  Many  more  de- 
serve the  thanks  of  the  public  for  contributions  to  the  following 
chapter. 


CHAPTER  V 

RECONSTRUCTING  CONGRESS 

The  conversion  of  Congress  from  a  political  machine  to  a 
legitimate  law-making  body  involves  difficulties  of  three  sepa- 
rate kinds:  Institutional,  political  and  parliamentary.  These 
cross  and  criss-cross  in  the  most  complicated  way. 

There  is  unanimity  of  opinion  regarding  the  principles  upon 
which  reconstruction  should  be  founded:  (1)  Complete  pub- 
licity at  every  stage  of  the  proceedings;  (2)  democracy,  or 
majority  rule,  throughout  elections  and  legislation;  (3)  the 
divorcing  of  the  spoils  of  politics  and  legislation;  and  (4)  hon- 
esty and  efficiency  in  the  conduct  of  the  public  business.  But 
none  of  these  basic  principles  can  be  fully  applied  to  national 
legislation  without  involving  all  three  kinds  of  change — institu- 
tional, political  and  parliamentary. 

Publicity  means  the  substitution  of  light  for  the  darkened 
processes  of  professional  politicians.  The  selection  of  Con- 
gress, its  organization,  its  standing  committees,  the  Committee 
of  the  Whole,  and  all  other  agencies  of  legislation  must  be 
brought  into  public  view.  But  this  cannot  be  accomplished 
alone  by  parliamentary  changes.  Simple  reforms  in  the  rules 
can  go  so  far  as  to  abolish  executive  sessions  and  compel 
public  records  in  all  the  subsidiary  bodies  of  Congress;  such 
parliamentary  remedies  as  electrical  voting  and  roll  calls  in 
the  Committee  of  the  Whole  will  eliminate  much  more  of 
darkness.  But  there  would  remain  inherently  dark  and  per- 
vertable  political  instruments  like  the  caucus,  which  has  no 
official  connection  with  Congress  and  over  which  Congress 
cannot  exercise  parliamentary  control.  And  even  with  all 
possible  parliamentary  and  political  agencies  of  light  applied, 
it  would  still  be  necessary  to  alter  the  Constitution  in  at  least 
two  respects  before  complete  publicity  could  be  attained: 
that  is,  to  do  away  with  a  bi-cameral  Congress,  which  does 
and  always  will  contribute  to  evasion  and  irresponsibility ;  and 

112 


YOUR  CONGRESS  113 

certainly  the  Constitution  should  also  be  changed  to  enable  a 
smaller  number  than  one-fifth  to  secure  record  votes. 

Democracy  means  majority  rule,  the  most  fundamental 
thing  of  all.  It  implies  deliberation  in  law-making.  There  is 
now  neither  majority  rule  nor  any  real  deliberation  in  Con- 
gress. Rules  reform  alone  can  do  much  to  eradicate  boss 
control,  which,  of  course,  is  the  antithesis  of  democracy.  But 
the  deeper  difficulties  can  be  reached  only  by  more  funda- 
mental remedies.  Here,  again,  enters  the  great  instrumentality 
of  bossism,  a  bi-cameral  Congress.  And  with  one  branch 
eliminated,  the  membership  of  the  remaining  body  would  have 
to  be  reduced  to  a  workable  number:  there  can  never  be  true 
democracy  and  deliberation  among  435  members.  Nor  can 
there  ever  be  real  majority  rule  in  the  deliberations  of  a  public 
body  until  majority  rule  governs  in  their  election :  the  members 
of  Congress  must  be  elected  by  a  system  of  proportional  rep- 
resentation, which,  to  be  ideal,  involves  both  political  and 
constitutional  changes. 

The  spoils  of  politics,  both  patronage  and  the  pork  barrel 
in  all  their  many  manifestations,  the  basic  influences  which 
make  politics  an  end  in  itself,  can  only  be  eradicated  when 
parliamentary  and  political  and  institutional  reforms  have  been 
jointly  applied.  Rules  reform  alone  can  eliminate  the  more 
superficial  and  petty  congressional  plunder;  but  the  bigger 
spoils  of  the  political  system  would  remain  as  a  perverting 
influence.  Only  such  fundamental  changes  as  proportional 
representation  and  a  budget  method  of  appropriations  will  ever 
satisfactorily  reach  and  rectify  the  corruptions  of  the  pork 
barrel. 

It  is  the  same  in  the  field  of  efficiency.  Publicity,  democ- 
racy and  the  elimination  of  spoils  all  enter  into  this  principle. 
And  in  this  connection  we  have  a  problem  apart  from  all 
others:  the  spectacle  of  a  national  legislature  giving  nine- 
tenths  of  its  attention  to  purely  local  and  private  matters.  To 
right  that  condition,  in  connection  with  all  the  obvious  mani- 


114  YOUR  CONGRESS 

festations  of  anti-efficiency  and  dishonesty,  it  will  be  neces- 
sary to  go  farther  than  rules  reform  alone  can  reach. 

The  complete  conversion  of  Congress  from  what  it  is  to 
what  it  ought  to  be  is,  therefore,  a  stupendous  task.  At  least 
a  decade,  perhaps  a  quarter  of  a  century,  will  be  necessary  for 
its  accomplishment.  It  is  not  strange  that  Congress  itself 
stands  appalled  at  the  magnitude  and  complexities  of  the  prob- 
lem. But  the  transition  is  easily  possible,  if  the  American 
people  will  first  survey  the  entire  situation,  decide  upon  a  pro- 
gram of  reconstruction,  and  then  in  turn  demand  of  their 
representatives  the  application  of  these  parliamentary  and 
political  and  institutional  remedies. 

Let  us  see  what  the  Congress,  already  elected  and  now 
assembling,  can  do  as  a  beginning. 

Standing  Committee:  Changes 

The  standing  committee  is  the  foundation  of  the  congres- 
sional machine.  It  has  been  explained  that  there  are  an  un- 
necessary number — fifty-eight — and  that  the  unneeded  com- 
mittees only  contribute  more  plunder  on  one  hand  and  extra 
safeguards  on  the  other  for  the  few  leaders  in  control  of  them. 

The  first  reform  in  this  field,  therefore,  is  to  eliminate  at 
least  half  of  the  standing  committees.  The  functions  of  the 
remaining  committees  should  then  be  equalized  as  much  as 
possible.    The  House  can  do  this  now. 

Election  of  Committee  Chairmen. — Each  committee  should 
select  its  own  chairman.  There  can  be  no  argument  against 
that.  And  it  would  be  a  body  blow  to  bossism  in  Congress. 
The  American  Congress  is  about  the  only  parliamentary  body 
in  the  civilized  world  which  is  now  organized  on  a  basis  of 
plunder  and  spoils.  Committee  chairmanships,  as  has  been 
shown,  are  used  by  the  leaders  as  subtle  bribes  by  which  they 
build  an  organization.  The  election  by  each  committee  of 
its  own  chairman  would  greatly  improve  that  condition.  Only 
a  simple  rule  is  necessary  to  make  this  important  change. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  115 

Committee  Clerks. — Next  important  to  chairmanships  in  its 
spoils  influence  is  the  question  of  the  regular  employees  of 
standing  committees.  These  clerks  should  be  controlled  by  the 
committee  rather  than  by  its  chairman.  They  should  be  used 
by  the  committee  for  public  business  and  not  by  the  chairman 
for  his  personal  political  work.  This  change  can  be  made  at 
once. 

Publicity  of  Committee  Meetings. — Just  a  simple  rule  would 
abolish  executive  sessions.  It  is  indefensible  and  an  insult 
to  the  public  that  Congress  should  have  permitted  its  commit- 
tees to  meet  in  darkness.  Every  standing  committee  should 
assemble  in  the  open  and  be  required  to  keep  a  public  record 
of  its  proceedings.  More  than  that,  a  journal  of  these  pro- 
ceedings should  be  published  at  adequate  stated  times — at 
least  twice  a  month — in  the  Congressional  Record.  The  work 
of  its  committees  is  at  present  far  more  important  to  the  public 
than  that  of  the  House  itself.  It  follows,  therefore,  that  it 
should  be  brought  into  public  view. 

Committee  Calendars. — Each  standing  committee  should  be 
required  to  keep  such  a  calendar  as  would  enable  every  one 
interested  to  know  at  any  time  the  exact  status  of  its  business. 
In  addition,  there  should  be  bulletins  posted  and  notices  printed 
in  the  Congressional  Record  announcing  all  meetings  and  for 
what  purpose.    That  can  be  done  now. 

Committee  Hearings  should  not  only  be  adequately  adver- 
tised, but  the  integrity  of  their  proceedings  should  be  safe- 
guarded. It  is  notoriously  true  that  the  printed  reports  o'f  such 
hearings  have  often  been  "edited"  to  suit  the  desires  of  those 
especially  interested.  The  public  has  a  right  to  a  verbatim, 
and  not  a  perverted,  report  of  what  is  said  and  done  in  com- 
mittee rooms. 

Reporting  Business. — Each  standing  and  special  committee 
should  be  required,  by  a  simple  rule,  to  report  back  to  the 
House,  within  a  stated  time,  all  bills  and  resolutions  given 
into  its  hands.    Such  a  rule  would  shake  the  foundation  forces 


116  YOUR  CONGRESS 

of  the  machine.    It  would  obviate  all  necessity  for  a  ''discharge 
calendar." 

Organisation  of  Committees. — The  question  of  how  stand- 
ing committees  are  selected  would  lose  most  of  its  present 
crucial  importance  if  their  plunder  were  removed  and  they 
were  forced  to  act  openly  in  accordance  with  the  foregoing 
suggestions.  If  standing  committees  had  no  obstructive 
powers,  and  recommendations  regarding  subsequent  proce- 
dure were  adopted,  it  would  matter  little  whether  they  were 
appointed  by  the  presiding  officer,  or  "elected"  by  the  House, 
excepting  for  one  principle — non-partisanship.  Partyism  is) 
V^the  parent  evil  in  the  existing  House  system.  The  House 
should  be  so  organized  as  to  serve  the  economic  interests  of 
the  whole  country  rather  than  the  spoils  interests  of  a  tempo- 
rarily dominant  party.  With  committees  elected  by  the  House 
or  appointed  by  the  Speaker,  the  majority  party  would  be 
favored.  To  take  a  position  against  this  practice  will,  of 
course,  seem  revolutionary  to  professional  politicians;  the 
people  themselves  have  so  long  known  only  the  doctrine,  "to 
the  victors  belong  the  spoils,"  that  they,  too,  may  take  alarm 
at  the  suggestion.  But  it  is  high  time  for  us  all  to  cease  con- 
fusing public  interests  and  political  interests.  It  is  all-impor- 
tant that  the  House  should  be  organized  on  a  non-partisan 
basis. 

Here  is  one  way  that  this  can  be  done.  There  are  at  present 
435  members  to  be  apportioned  among,  say,  twenty-nine  com- 
mittees. I  would  for  this  purpose  divide  the  country  into 
fifteen  districts,  each  having  twenty-nine  representatives,  with 
territory  as  contiguous  as  possible.  Then  have  the  representa- 
tives of  each  of  these  fifteen  districts  meet  publicly,  with  duly 
recorded  proceedings,  and  elect  from  their  own  number  one 
member  to  each  of  the  twenty-nine  committees.  This  method 
would  not  only  eliminate  partyism  in  organization,  but  also 
the  sectionalism  that  now  prevails.  In  addition  it  would  re- 
duce the  influence  of  seniority  to  such  an  extent  that  new  mem- 
bers would  have  a  voice  in  legislation. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  117 

If,  in  the  years  ahead,  the  membership  is  reduced,  it  will 
further  simplify  this  problem  of  organization. 

Other  Steps  the  House  Can  Take 

Electrical  Voting. — The  political  leaders  of  the  Sixty-fourth 
Congress  have  the  power  to  extend  publicity  to  all  the  processes 
of  legislation.  In  this  connection,  electrical  voting  should  be 
provided.  It  now  requires  nearly  an  hour  for  a  roll  call  in  the 
House.  Electrical  systems  have  been  devised  by  which  the 
same  vote  could  be  taken  in  two  or  three  minutes,  and  much 
more  accurately  than  by  the  yea  and  nay  method.  The  fact 
that  the  House  has  not  made  this  simple  change  is  most  illu- 
minating. The  leaders  seem  to  be  opposed  to  devices  which 
will  expedite  business :  their  political  purposes  are  better 
served  by  a  hopeless  congestion  of  business.  And  electrical 
voting  would  remove  their  stock  excuse — "roll  calls  require 
too  much  time" — for  not  permitting  record  votes.  Therefore, 
being  better  served  by  darkness,  they  have  failed  to  install 
electrical  voting. 

Obviously  there  should  be  installed  at  once  a  system  of  elec- 
trical voting. 

Roll  calls  by  this  system  should  be  provided  in  the  Commit- 
tee of  the  Whole,  if  the  House  persists  in  its  alias. 

Abolish  Short  Session. — Congress  can  and  should  advance 
by  nearly  a  year  its  time  of  meeting.  Members  are  now 
elected  in  November.  If  there  is  not  a  special  session,  they  do 
not  take  office  until  December  of  the  following  year.  This  is 
absurd.  And  it  contributes  vitally  to  bad  legislation  and  bad 
politics.  The  last  session  of  each  Congress  is  held  after  a  new 
Congress  has  been  elected.  For  that  reason,  being  the  longest 
possible  distance  from  another  election,  this  short  session  is 
notoriously  irresponsible  and  extravagant.  Politically  dan- 
gerous questions  are  always  considered  in  the  short  session. 
A  record  made  them  in  only  about  half  as  important  as  at  other 
times,  because  the  members  already  defeated  are  not  so  vitally 
concerned  and  the  newly-elected  members  have  not  been  seated. 


118  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Congress  is  primarily  a  political  playground.  This  practice 
contributes  to  that  condition.  Not  taking  office  until  thir- 
teen months  after  election,  members  have  less  than  a  year 
in  which  to  ''campaign"  for  re-election.  It  is  inevitable  under 
this  senseless  arrangement  that  99  per  cent  of  the  membership 
should  weigh  every  word  and  act  only  in  the  Hght  of  election 
precedents  and  prospects. 

A  change  in  this  respect  would  also  do  away  with  special 
sessions,  which  are  an  added  expense  to  the  people. 

Each  Congress  should  be  convened  in  regular  session  at 
least  by  the  January  following  elections.  No  constitutional 
amendment  is  necessary  to  bring  about  this  reform.  Congress 
already  has  the  authority  to  make  the  change. 

Secretaries  on  the  Pay  Roll. — The  House  should  remove 
from  members  the  temptation  to  graft  from  their  allowance 
for  clerk  hire.  All  employes  should  be  placed  upon  the  pay 
roll. 

The  Pranking  Privilege. — Free  use  of  the  mails  by  Con- 
gressmen is  grossly  abused.  It  is  the  old,  old  story  of  politics, 
rather  than  public  service.  The  franking  privilege  should  be 
restricted  to  the  legitimate  interests  of  the  public. 

Integrity  of  the  Records. — Two  conspicuous  evils  enter  into 
almost  every  edition  of  the  Congressional  Record.  These  are 
abuse  of  the  "leave  to  print"  privilege,  and  verbal  changes 
in  speeches  made  on  the  floor  of  the  House.  If  you  are  one  of 
the  minute  minority  that  reads  the  Congressional  Record,  you 
probably  regard  it  as  an  accurate  portrayal  of  what  the  House 
has  said  and  done.  This  is  far  from  true.  There  has  grown 
up  the  practice  of  permitting  members  to  ''edit"  the  speeches 
they  actually  deliver.  Frequently  I  have  listened  to  remarks 
which  bore  little  resemblance  to  what  would  appear  the  next 
day  in  the  printed  record. 

The  Congressional  Record  should  contain  no  "leave  to  print" 
matter.  It  should  include  only  what  is  said  and  done  on  the 
floor  of  the  House,  and  certainly  this  should  be  a  true,  verbatim 
report  of  the  proceedings. 


YOUR  CONGRESS    ,  119 

Election  Contests. — When  the  House  faces  an  election  con- 
test, and  there  are  several  every  Congress,  the  customary 
thing  is  to  drag  it  along  until  the  regular  session,  which  does 
not  meet  until  thirteen  months  after  election,  is  nearly  over. 
Then,  if  the  contestant  is  seated,  they  pay  his  salary  for  the 
whole  Congress  and  also  that  of  the  ousted  member  up  to  the 
time  the  case  was  decided.  If  the  House  will  not  do  it  volun- 
tarily, there  should  be  a  rule  requiring  a  decision  on  all  con- 
tested cases  within  a  reasonable  time. 

A  "Gateway"  Rules  Amendment. — Above  all  else,  as  a  be- 
gining,  there  should  be  a  simple  rule  requiring  that  every  pro- 
posal for  changes  in  the  rules  should,  within  a  reasonable  time, 
be  reported  to  the  House  for  its  decision. 

If  it  were  possible,  before  the  next  House  convenes,  ade- 
quately to  educate  new  members  and  the  public  as  to  the 
meaning  of  parliamentary  reform,  there  should  be  an  attempt, 
on  the  opening  day,  to  adopt  entirely  new  rules.  But  whether 
or  not  complete  revision  of  the  rules  is  undertaken  then,  there 
should  be  provided  a  workable  method  of  securing  parliamen- 
tary changes.  It  is  unthinkable  that  the  Committee  on  Rules 
should  have  absolute  obstructive  powers  in  that  direction. 

In  short,  the  House  now  has  the  power  to  provide  for  pu- 
blicity throughout  the  processes  of  legislation;  it  can  abolish 
the  congressional  side  of  plunder;  and  many  parliamentary 
changes  in  the  public  interest  may  be  made  at  once.  But  some 
of  the  basic  difficulties  lie  deeper.  For  example,  consider  what 
must  be  done — 

For  the:  Rei^iEi^  of  Conge^stion 

If  the  standing  committees  were  organized  democraticly, 
and  worked  openly  for  the  public,  with  none  of  their  present 
powers  of  obstruction,  the  legislative  situation  would  be  greatly 
improved,  but  still  far  from  remedied.  I  would  go  farther  than 
to  compel  committees  to  report  all  business  back  to  the  House. 
There  should  be  a  limit  upon  the  time  when  bills  could  be 


120  YOUR  CONGRESS 

introduced;  probably  the  first  two  months  of  a  session  would 
be  sufficient.  That,  with  the  almost  automatic  reporting  back 
of  bills  and  resolutions,  would  bring  everything  before  the 
House  in  ample  time  for  deliberate  action.  But  what  a  hope- 
less congestion  of  business  would  result !  What  is  the  remedy 
in  this  respect?  It  is  to  eliminate  a  thousand  and  one  differ- 
ent subjects  of  legislation  with  which  Congress  should  not  be 
burdened,  and  confine  its  activities  strictly  to  national  matters. 

A  Budget  System. — First  of  these  eliminations  should  be  the 
twelve  or  fifteen  separate  appropriation  bills  which  at  present 
take  up  one-third  to  one-half  of  the  time  of  every  regular  ses- 
sion. The  political  and  parliamentary  significances  of  these 
bills  have  been  explained.  These  measures  not  only  require 
more  time  than  all  other  public  matters  combined,  but  their 
pork  barrel  influence  is  responsible  for  most  of  the  corruptions 
and  perversions  in  national  legislation.  There  should  be  sub- 
stituted for  the  present  wasteful,  inefficient,  corrupting  meth- 
ods of  appropriating  public  money  a  responsible  budget  system. 
The  President  and  his  Cabinet  should  be  empowered  to  pre- 
pare and  introduce  the  budget.  With  the  constitution  as  at 
present,  this  budget  would  have  to  be  acted  upon  by  Congress 
at  least  once  each  biennium.  But  once  in  each  administration 
would  be  far  better.  With  the  budget  system  adopted,  there 
should  be  no  appropriations  committee  in  Congress.  The 
budget  should  be  introduced  by  the  administration,  after  full 
publicity  in  its  preparation,  and  at  once  have  the  same  status 
as  would  a  bill  reported  from  a  committee.  The  President 
and  his  Cabinet  members  should  be  granted  the  privilege  of 
the  House  and  expected  to  participate  in  all  debate  on  the 
budget. 

Deficiency  appropriations  could  be  handled  in  the  same  way. 

Abuses  and  extravagances  would  probably  at  first  enter  into 
such  a  budget  system ;  but  they  could  not  possibly  equal  the 
evils  that  exist  in  the  present  congressional  method.  The 
tendency  would  be  toward  honesty  and  efficiency.  And  the 
compensations  of  the  change  to  the  public  in  saving  the  time 


YOUR  CONGRESS  121 

of  Congress  and  in  divorcing  legislation  from  spoils  would  be 
immeasurable. 

Having  the  President  and  his  Cabinet  become  sponsor  for 
the  budget,  and  assume  responsibility  for  public  appropria- 
tions, may  seem  at  variance  with  the  position  expressed  in 
reference  to  partyism.  But  there  is  no  other  proper  place  for 
the  responsibility  to  be  placed.  And  this  would  have  a  tendency 
to  make  parties  represent  something  vital  to  public  welfare — 
the  economies  and  efficiencies  of  government  on  the  business 
side — whereas  now  their  differences  are  only  sham  differences. 

Only  through  a  budget  system,  coupled  with  elections  by  pro- 
portional representation,  can  the  vicious  pork  barrel  be  elimi- 
nated from  legislation. 

And  a  budget  system  would  free,  for  the  consideration  of 
public  matters,  probably  one-half  of  the  time  of  Congress. 
It  would  contribute  the  biggest  single  element  to  relieve  the 
congestion  of  business. 

The  District  of  Columbia. — Another  elimination  would  be  to 
treat  the  people  of  the  District  of  Columbia  as  human  beings, 
giving  them  control  of  their  local  affairs.  The  Sixty-second 
Congress  changed  the  name  of  "Sixteenth  Street"  in  Washing- 
ton to  "The  Avenue  of  the  Presidents."  The  last  Congress 
changed  it  back.  Isn't  that  big  business  for  the  national  legis- 
lature? Under  the  rules,  two  Mondays  a  month  are  given  to 
District  matters.  That  consumes  about  one-thirteenth  of  the 
whole  time  of  the  House. 

Self-government  for  the  District  of  Columbia  would  not 
only  rid  Congress  of  a  demoralizing  influence,  but  also  re- 
move an  added  reason  why  there  is  such  a  congestion  of 
business,  with  practically  no  time  to  deliberate  on  important 
public  questions. 

Private  vs.  National  Legislation. — Probably  three-fourths 
of  the  time  not  now  given  to  "privileged"  matters  is  taken 
up  with  the  consideration  of  purely  local  and  private  bills. 
In  this  respect  Congress  appears  more  like  a  municipal  council 
than  a  national  legislature.     All  measures  and  matters  which 


122  YOUR  CONGRESS 

do  not  include  the  general  public  in  their  scope  should  be  taken 
out  of  the  hands  of  Congress.  This  elimination  would  include 
local  and  personal  bills  of  every  character ;  pensions,  claims,  etc. 

At  present,  if  the  Court  of  Claims,  supposed  to  settle  such 
questions,  refused  to  allow  a  certain  claim,  in  all  probability 
the  matter  would  be  brought  into  Congress  through  the  intro- 
duction of  a  bill.  It  is  the  same  with  pensions.  What  the 
Pension  Department  regards  as  too  questionable  to  be  acted 
upon  is  taken  into  Congress.  In  a  degradingly  petty  way, 
Congress  has  become  the  supreme  court  of  plunder  and  spoils. 

This  limitation  of  the  functions  of  Congress  to  strictly  pub- 
lic matters,  national  in  scope,  together  with  a  substitution  of 
the  budget  system  of  appropriations,  and  other  eliminations, 
would  give  Congress  the  time  for  real  deliberation  on  important 
questions.  These  changes  would  also  do  much  to  make  Con- 
gress serve  public  rather  than  political  interests.  But  even 
these  reforms,  and  the  improved  parliamentary  instrumentali- 
ties previously  outlined,  would  not  insure  either  democracy 
or  true  deliberation  in  the  fullest  sense  until  other  influences 
had  been  removed. 

Patronage 

A  budget  system,  together  with  proportional  representation, 
would  eliminate  the  pork  barrel ;  but  the  vicious  influence  of 
patronage  would  remain.  The  best  remedy  is  to  place  all  ap- 
pointive positions,  below  those  of  the  Cabinet,  under  civil  serv- 
ice. This  implies,  of  course,  that  the  civil  service  system 
shall  be  above  and  beyond  political  manipulation,  as  it  is  not 
at  present. 

There  may  be  objection  to  this.  Certainly  the  professional 
politicians  will  protest.  And  disinterested  citizens  may  not  at 
first  comprehend  its  meaning.  One  of  the  most  tenaciously 
rooted  fallacies  of  "popular"  government  is  the  belief  that 
democracy  is  most  fully  expressed  in  elections ;  instead,  democ- 
racy is  best  expressed  in  the  results,  rather  than  the  forms  of 
government — in  those  things  which  are  the  farthest  removed 


YOUR  CONGRESS  123 

from  practical  politics.  The  "fathers"  were  right  when  they 
sought  a  separation  of  administrative  and  legislative  branches 
of  the  government.  But  now  there  is  no  such  separation ;  the 
two  are  crossed  and  criss-crossed,  and  with  the  judiciary  as 
well.  All  patronage  must  be  divorced  from  legislation.  In  this 
connection,  the  Constitution  should  be  changed  to  enable  the 
President  to  select  his  cabinet  without  the  concurrence  of  the 
Senate. 

A  One:  Branch  Congress 

Even  with  every  foregoing  suggestion  applied,  the  national 
legislature  would  not  be  fully  safeguarded  against  perverted 
political  influence,  nor  completely  efficient  and  responsible, 
so  long  as  it  remained  a  bi-cameral  Congress.  Politics  in  the 
interest  of  politicians,  and  not  legislation  in  the  interest  of  the 
public,  will  always  be  possible  and  probable  with  two  branches 
of  equal  authority.  Inefficiency,  irresponsibility  and  political 
horse-play  will  inevitably  attend  a  bi-cameral  Congress.  Where 
there  might  be  one  case  in  which  the  public  would  benefit  from 
two  branches,  there  would  be  a  hundred  of  opposite  importance 
to  the  people. 

It  should  not  be  a  question  of  abolishing  either  House  or 
Senate,  but  of  doing  away  with  both  and  creating  a  new  body 
along  ideal  lines.  There  is  no  reason  why  the  ideal  cannot 
be  realized  in  lawmaking  machinery.  But  if  it  were  necessary 
to  choose  between  them  and  retain  one  or  the  other,  I  would 
abolish,  not  the  Senate,  but  the  House.  The  Senate  is  now 
far  more  democratic  and  deliberative  than  the  House.  Its 
records  are  more  in  the  open.  Its  members  are  elected  for 
longer  terms,  a  distinct  advantage.  Its  membership  is  more 
nearly  the  number  the  one  branch  should  contain.  Not  now 
being  elected  by  districts,  it  would  be  easier  to  adopt  the  pro- 
portional representation  principle  in  their  selection.  In  brief, 
it  would  involve  less  of  reconstruction,  and  less  of  a  strain 
upon  our  traditional  habits  of  thought,  to  convert  the  Senate 
into  an  efficient,  responsible,  democratic  law-making  body  than 
would  be  necessary  in  the  case  of  the  House. 


124  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Reduction  in  Membership 

True  deliberation  is  a  fundamental  necessity  in  legislation. 
Deliberation  implies  that  every  member  shall  have  equal  oppor- 
tunity to  represent  his  constituents.  This  ideal  condition  cannot 
exist  with  435  members.  Some  form  of  bossism  is  necessary 
among  that  number,  if  business  is  to  be  done.  Congress 
should  have  but  one  body,  and  the  membership  of  the  one 
branch  should  not  exceed  150. 

Elected  for  Longer  Terms 

Members  should  be  elected  not  oftener  than  once  in  six 
years.  It  is  inevitable  that  politics  will  prevail  over  all  other 
considerations  in  any  public  body  with  elections  every  biennum. 
The  terms  of  members  should  be  increased,  with  adequate 
recall  provisions  to  safeguard  the  people. 

Proportional  Representation 

Above  all  else  in  elections,  Congressmen  should  be  selected 
by  a  system  of  proportional  representation.  There  is  no  other 
way  to  insure  democracy  in  the  selection  of  these  officials. 

The  principle  of  preferential  voting  is  also  most  important. 

The  ideal,  then,  is  a  single  branch  Congress,  removed  as 
far  as  possible  from  both  executive  and  judicial  checks,  re- 
sponsible only  to  the  people;  with  its  membership,  elected  for 
longer  terms,  by  proportional  representation,  small  enough  to 
insure  democracy  and  deliberation  in  all  proceedings;  with  its 
business  strictly  confined  to  public  matters ;  with  efficiency  and 
publicity  provided  at  every  stage. 

This  is  an  outline  of  the  Congressional  reconstruction  pro- 
gram of  the  National  Voters'  League.  It  is  one  of  the  three 
reforms  necessary  to  end  the  corruptions  and  perversions  of 
modern  politics,  to  reduce  politics  from  principal  to  agent  in 
government.  The  other  two — adequate  political  education,  or 
publicity,  and  the  non-partisan,  anti-spoils,  balance-of -power 
idea  in  elections  and  legislation — will  be  discussed  in  the  final 
chapter. 


AS  CITIZEN  INSTEAD  OF  SUBJECT 

America  is  an  experiment  in  democracy.  This  try  out  of 
popular  government  is  succeeding. 

So  far,  the  success  of  democracy  in  this  country  consists  chiefly 
in  the  safe  nurturing  of  a  new  idea  in  government — that  of  the 
individual  as  citizen  instead  of  subject.  Therein  lies  the  difference 
between  monarchy  and  democracy.  It  is  a  shifting  of  sovereignty 
from  a  ruling  house  or  class  to  society  itself.  The  old  world  today 
is  in  mighty  travail,  torn  and  tortured  with  the  struggle  to  give 
birth  to  democracy  in  government. 

That  agony  is  over  here.  Our  sovereignty  is  a  fact.  And  other,  » 
less  painful,  forward  experiences  are  approaching.  We  are 
having,  for  the  first  time,  a  vision  of  sovereignty  and  society  seen 
together.  We  are  just  beginning  to  realize  that  the  scope  of  govern- 
ment reaches  far  beyond  all  previous  conceptions;  that  its  functions 
extend  to  every  concern  of  the  common  welfare. 

Men  and  women  together  compose  society.  Our  sovereignty  is 
seeing  that. 

Old  age  pensions  is  another  sign.  It  is  not  prophecy  to  assert 
that  soon  this  nation  will  be  ready  and  eager  to  recognize  that  its 
patriotism  can  be  as  righteously  exercised  in  administering  to 
those  fallen  in  industrial  warfare  as  to  worthy  heroes  of  the  battle- 
field; and  that  the  state  will  be  as  well  served  by  one  as  the  other. 

Justice,  rather  than  charity,  is  coming  within  the  range  of  our 
national  vision.  And  we  are  beginning  to  see  both  Justice  and 
charity  among  the  legitimate  functions  of  government. 

Above  all  else,  in  the  great  awakening,  there  is  coming  to  sover- 
eignty the  consciousness  that  government  is  largely  a  matter  of 
business — big,  all-important  public  business. 

There  would  be  no  need  of  this  little  book,  if  we  had  sooner  seen 
these  things,  and  other  things.  But  the  failures  of  democracy 
were  only  natural.  As  sovereigns  we  had  to  work  out  our  own 
upbringing.  There  were  no  older  relatives  or  friends  to  guide  our 
infancy.     The  experience  of  the  world  before  us  had  been  with  the 

125 


136  YOUR  CONGRESS 

old  idea  of  the  individual  as  subject.  When  in  the  childhood  of 
our  sovereignty,  we  were  children,  running  at  large,  happy  and 
neglectful  of  the  new  freedom.  Like  a  barefoot  boy  with  torn  toe, 
we  exhibited  the  wounds  of  war.  We  were  boastful,  and  believed 
there  was  nothing  to  do  but  enjoy  the  new  order.  Even  today, 
with  its  fruits  of  failure  apparent  on  every  side,  we  have  hardly 
outlived  the  habit  of  beholding  government  largely  through  eyes  of 
sentiment,  as  a  thing  apart  from  the  people. 

The  dollars  and  cents  meaning  of  government  has  always  been 
known  to  predatory  interests,  and  public  indifference  to  that  truth 
has  been  Aladdin  s  lamp  to  them. 

Taking  the  fullest  advantage  of  the  same  popular  indifference, 
of  the  remoteness  of  government,  professional  politicians  have,  for 
their  own  ends,  built  up  a  system  which  m.akes  them  the  chief 
beneficiaries  of  our  sovereignty. 

This  perverted,  end-in-itself  political  system  is  the  first  problem, 
because  its  solution  must  precede  the  long  neglected  unifying  of 
sovereignty  and  society.  Politics,  the  instrument  df  sovereignty, 
must  be  made  to  serve  the  interests  of  society. 

In  Chapter  II  there  are  outlined  the  three  fundam^ental  in- 
fluences necessary  to  convert  politics  from  principal  to  agent  in 
government:  (1)  reforms  in  the  parliamentary  methods  and 
machinery  of  legislation;  (2)  political  education  for  all  the  people; 
and  (3)  the  functioning  of  this  information  through  the  independent, 
anti-spoils,  balance  of  power  position  in  elections  and  legislation. 
The  work  of  the  National  Voters^  League  is  based  upon  these  three 
foundation  ideas  in  political  reform. 

The  first  of  these — congressional  reconstruction — Ims  been  dis- 
cussed. The  National  Voters^  League  recommends  and  will  work 
for  rules  reform  along  the  lines  laid  down  in  the  preceding  chapter. 

It  only  remains  to  consider  what  may  be  done  to  help  the  citizen 
reclaim  his  or  her  sovereignty,  through  publicity,  and  exercise  it 
in  anti-political  ways. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  NATIONAL  VOTERS'  LEAGUE 

In  recent  years  there  has  come  to  the  people  an  under- 
standing of  their  personal  interest  in  government.  This  dis- 
covery of  the  material  meaning  of  government  was  followed 
naturally  by  a  desire  to  discriminate  as  to  efficient  and  ineffi- 
cient public  officials.  The  problem,  then,  was  how  to  inter- 
pret the  record  and  measure  the  service  of  those  entrusted 
with  their  political  affairs.  Out  of  the  searching  for  instru- 
mentalities has  been  evolved  a  new  implement  of  citizenship 
called  the  voters'  league. 

The  mission  of  a  voters'  league  is  to  learn  the  exact  truth 
about  public  business  and  report  back  to  the  people.  It  meets 
democracy's  most  urgent  need. 

The  city  furnished  the  first  test  of  this  new  instrument  of 
democracy.  In  several  municipalities,  under  various  names, 
it  was  used  most  effectually  to  purify  and  make  more  efficient 
the  local  law-making  bodies.  Next  it  was  tried  successfully  in 
certain  states  with  reference  to  their  legislatures. 

Wherever  the  idea  has  had  adequate  trial  two  fundamental 
facts  stand  out  of  the  experiences  of  voters'  leagues: 

With  honest  information  in  their  hands,  the  people  will 
choose  the  right  course  in  their  political  affairs. 

It  is  futile  to  attempt  to  obtain  reforms  through  reluctant 
legislators  and  unworkable  legislative  machinery. 

The  first  statement  is  obviously  true.  Otherwise  popular 
government  is  foredoomed  to  failure.  Without  basic  confi- 
dence in  the  intelligence  and  integrity  of  the  people,  it  is  use- 
less to  struggle.  If  the  people,  properly  fortified  with  facts, 
cannot  be  trusted,  then  all  attempts  to  secure  more  equitable 
human  relationships  had  better  be  abandoned.  If  our  sov- 
ereignty is  a  failure,  then  Europe's  turmoil  must  also  be  our 
national  destiny. 

127 


128  YOUR  CONGRESS 

The  second  assertion  means  that  there  are  two  distinct 
steps  in  all  this  fighting  upward,  steps  which  must  be  taken  in 
order:  (1)  The  people  must  first  get  control  of  their  own 
government :  law-makers  must  be  chosen  who  are  independent 
and  efficient,  and  law-making  machinery  must  be  provided 
which  will  enable  those  officials  to  exercise  their  independence 
of  political  and  special  interests.  (2)  Then  only  will  it  be 
possible  to  legislate  seasonably  and  wisely  in  the  interest  of 
the  public. 

Taking  the  first  step — getting  control  of  the  personal  and 
parliamentary  instrumentalities  of  legislation — is  common 
fighting  ground  for  every  forward  force  in  the  country.  Every 
man  and  woman,  regardless  of  conflicting  economic  beliefs, 
should  unite  with  every  other  person  in  the  effort  to  make 
Congress  deliberate  and  representative  of  the  people.  To  help 
toward  that  end  is  the  sole  object  of  the  National  Voters' 
League. 

This  movement  grew  out  of  experiments  in  Minnesota  with 
the  voters'  league  idea.  It  was  the  discovery  of  a  law  of 
politics,  as  unfailing  almost  as  the  law  of  gravity,  which  led 
to  the  organization  of  a  group  of  patriotic  men  and  women  to 
reclaim  the  legislature  of  that  State.  In  Minnesota,  a  few 
years  ago,  a  certain  corrupt  politician  was  a  candidate  for 
re-election  to  the  legislature.  His  success  seemed  assured. 
Personally  very  popular,  he  had  practically  no  opposition;  he 
belonged  to  the  predominant  party;  the  second  term  custom 
decreed  that  he  should  be  returned;  not  more  than  a  dozen 
in  his  district  were  aware  of  his  real  official  character.  One 
of  these  twelve,  however,  had  his  record  carefully  analyzed 
and  a  digest  given  to  every  elector.  The  result  was  his  defeat, 
overwhelmingly,  by  an  unknown  man. 

There  followed  other  experiments,  first  in  isolated  cases 
and  then  quite  generally.  In  the  end  it  was  undeniably  demon- 
strated that  the  people  could  be  trusted— that  the  rank  and  file 
always  would  act  upon  accurate  information  as  to  the  public 


YOUR  CONGRESS  129 

character  of  candidates ;  that  if  the  actual  record  of  any  aspi- 
rant for  pubHc  position  was  placed  before  the  people,  they 
would  elect  or  defeat  him  according  to  the  measure  of  his 
merit  and  their  own  welfare. 

The  voters'  league  work  in  Minnesota,  without  discussing 
details,  influenced  four  important  results : 

First,  and  most  important,  is  the  fact  that  almost  every  citi- 
zen of  that  State  has  been  given  an  accurate  picture  of  what 
past  legislatures  have  been,  and  it  follows  logically  that  they 
know  what  present  and  future  legislatures  ought  to  be.  Not 
in  another  generation  at  least  will  it  be  possible  for  a  legisla- 
ture in  Minnesota  to  meet  without  having  the  eyes  of  the 
people  understandingly  upon  it.  Nor  will  legislative  elec- 
tions be  held  without  the  closest  scrutiny  and  discrimination  as 
to  candidates. 

Second,  the  publicity  given  the  third  house  and  supply  pur- 
chase grafts  have  probably  forever  ended  those  practices. 
The  element  of  political  plunder  no  longer  predominates. 

Third,  Minnesota  now  has  non-partisan  elections  to  both 
House  and  Senate.  The  importance  of  that  is  beyond  the 
comprehension  of  those  of  us  who  have  been  taught  and  still 
practice  the  false  philosophy  of  partyism. 

Fourth,  that  work  in  Minnesota  resulted  in  such  reforms 
of  the  rules  as  partly  to  democratize  the  procedure.  Nothing 
could  be  expected  of  the  legislature  until  that  had  been  done. 

That  Minnesota  effort  succeeded,  and  yet  it  failed.  We  soon 
discovered  that  the  political  stream  had  its  sources  higher  up, 
that  the  chief  corruptions  came  from  above.  We  might  do  a 
thorough  work  of  renovating  locally,  but  it  would  not  last. 
There  would  sweep  down  upon  us,  out  of  the  national  field, 
vicious  influences  to  undo  what  had  been  accomplished  at 
home.  Then  it  became  apparent  that  the  education  and  recon- 
struction would  have  to  be  directed  at  the  system  higher  up. 
Accordingly  the  movement  was  made  national  in  scope. 

The  National  Voters'  League  is  an  attempt  to  bring  Con- 


130  YOUR  CONGRESS 

gress  closer  to  the  people.  The  average  state  legislature  is  iso- 
lated enough  for  the  purposes  of  politicians,  but  Congress, 
with  publicity  and  parliamentary  and  political  conditions  as 
they  are,  might  as  well  convene  on  Mars  or  the  moon,  so  far 
as  the  public  is  concerned. 

Educationai.  Work  of  the  Lkague 

The  object  of  the  National  Voters'  League,  in  bridging 
this  distance,  is  to  publish  such  information  as  will  enable  the 
people  to  know  what  Congress  is  doing,  and  how,  and  by 
whom.  The  two  most  needed  changes,  improvement  in  the 
personnel  and  in  the  procedure  of  Congress,  then  will  follow. 
Public  opinion,  if  liberated,  will  accomplish  both  of  these  cru- 
cial changes.  Public  opinion,  now  manipulated  at  will  by  pro- 
fessional politicians,  and  misdirected  to  serve  their  purposes, 
is  the  all-important  element  in  democratic  government. 

The  National  Voters'  League  will  have  nothing  to  do  with 
the  issues  that  come  before  Congress,  excepting  to  relate  their 
legislative  history  and  to  record  the  attitude  of  Senators  and 
Representatives.  Its  information  will  be  directed  solely  to 
improving  the  personnel  of  Congress  and  to  reforming  its  pro- 
cedure. Publicity  will  be  the  only  weapon.  This  educational 
work  will  be  divided  into — 

1.  The  furnishing,  at  all  times,  to  members  and  others  inter- 
ested, of  any  desired  information  as  to  the  provisions  or  status 
of  bills,  the  work  of  caucuses  and  committees,  the  votes  and 
attitude  of  members,  etc. 

2.  The  issuing  of  bulletins  to  members,  newspapers,  maga- 
zines, schools,  and  libraries,  giving  special  emphasis  to  such 
matters  as  seem  to  require  public  attention  at  the  moment. 

3.  The  publication  of  special  reports,  at  proper  times  in  cam- 
paign periods,  giving  to  any  district  or  State  information  as 
to  the  record  of  its  Congressman  or  Senator. 

4.  The  publication  of  a  book  each  year  in  which  the  chief 
acts  of  Congress  shall  be  carefully  analyzed,  the  records  of 


YOUR  CONGRESS  131 

members  shown,  and  such  other  facts  given  as  will  enable  those 
interested  to  have,  in  permanent  reference  form,  a  history  of 
the  national  legislation  of  that  period. 

The  National  Voters'  League  was  organized  just  prior  to 
the  begining  of  the  Sixty-third  Congress.  The  congressional 
situation  was  so  dark  and  complicated  in  all  things  that  the 
League  has  given  practically  the  entire  time  since  1913  to  a 
preliminary  survey  of  conditions,  to  such  a  study  of  the  ma- 
chinery and  methods  of  national  legislation  as  would  enable 
the  movement  to  proceed  upon  a  sure  foundation  of  informa- 
tion. This  foundation  building  is  now  accomplished  and, 
beginning  with  the  Sixty-fourth  Congress,  the  League  will 
engage  persistently  in  publicity  work. 

Despite  the  necessity  of  devoting  all  the  forces  available  to 
investigative  work,  to  foundation  building,  the  League  has 
during  the  past  two  years  accomplished  a  great  deal  in  the 
educational  field. 

Its  first  bulletin,  issued  in  January,  1914,  disclosed  the  prac- 
tices of  the  majority  party  caucus  in  legislation,  showing 
exactly  how  this  unofficial,  irresponsible  device  operated  to 
disfranchise  members  and  bring  about  minority  rule. 

In  March,  1914,  there  was  issued  a  second  bulletin  of  funda- 
mental importance,  dealing  with  the  bi-partisan  boss  system  of 
organizing  and  controlling  Congress. 

For  the  1914  campaigns,  the  League  prepared  a  big  tabula- 
tion, revealing  the  record  of  each  of  the  435  members  of  the 
House  on  forty-four  important  roll  calls.  This  was  the  first 
time  in  the  history  of  the  country  that  such  a  thing  was  done. 
That  work  alone  required  months  of  patient,  painstaking  in- 
vestigation. 

A  bulletin  dealing  with  the  parliamentary  aspects  of  the 
Hobson  prohibition  amendment,  with  all  the  official  proceed- 
ings in  reference  to  that  resolution,  was  issued  in  January, 
1915. 

In  March,  1915,  there  was  published  a  bulletin  entitled, 
''New  Members  and  the  House  Machine."     This  was  sent 


132  YOUR  CONGRESS 

to  all  newly  elected  Congressmen.  It  was  intended  to  acquaint 
them  with  conditions  of  which  men  entering  Congress  ordi- 
narily know  nothing.  It  outlined  the  things  that  new  members 
might  do  to  change  conditions  in  their  own  interest  and  that 
of  the  public. 

The  League  has  responded  to  many  appeals,  from  country 
wide  sources,  for  information  in  respect  to  individuals  and 
issues  in  Congress. 

Such  publicity  work  will  now  be  emphasized  a  dozen  fold. 
The  chief  consistent  feature  of  this  will  be  a  monthly  bulletin, 
entitled  The  Searchlight  on  Congress.  Subscriptions  to  this 
regular  publication  will  be  $1  a  year.  Each  subscriber  will  be 
a  member  of  the  National  Voters'  League  and  in  every  way 
a  sharer  in  the  labor  and  results  of  the  movement. 

Through  its  regular  and  special  publications,  the  League 
will  work  to  make  Congress  a  local  issue  everywhere.  There 
is  now  no  connecting  link,  except  perverted  publicity  controlled 
by  politicians,  between  Congress  and  the  people.  The  League 
will  work  to  bridge,  with  accurate,  timely  information,  the 
long,  mysterious  distance  between  Congress  and  the  people. 

BaIvAnce:  of  Power  Groups 

The  functioning  element  in  this  movement  must  come  from 
the  people.  Assuming  that  the  League  will  in  a  few  years  be 
able  to  present  a  true  picture  of  Congress,  individually  and 
as  a  whole,  to  every  section  of  the  country,  upon  what  princi- 
ple of  politics  should  the  politically  disinterested  public  act? 

It  has  been  explained  that  there  are  only  two  basic  princi- 
ples upon  which  such  functioning  can  be  founded:  One  is  to 
work  through  political  parties,  in  an  attempt  to  control  the 
prevailing  party;  the  other  is  to  secure  the  balance  of  power 
in  elections.  The  first  means  politics,  the  second  a  breaking 
up  of  politics.    Obviously,  the  second  is  the  course  to  take. 

To  succeed  in  its  purpose,  the  National  Voters'  League 
must  have  the  active  cooperation  of  many  people.     This  co- 


YOUR  CONGRESS  133 

operation  must  be  systematic  and  concentrated  in  the  various 
congressional  districts.  Until  democracy  has  advanced  to  a 
point  where  the  present  basis  of  representation  shall  be  aban- 
doned, the  district  seems  logically  to  be  the  unit  upon  which 
to  build  local  functioning  forces. 

Therefore  the  League  will  work  to  organize  its  members 
into  balance  of  power  groups,  one  in  each  congressional  dis- 
trict. The  balance  of  power  in  this  connection  implies  public 
rather  than  political  objects :  it  means  complete  independence 
of  poHtical  organization.  It  signifies  more  than  passive  non- 
partisanship.  It  means  a  militant  attitude  against  the  spoils 
and  perversions  of  all  parties. 

To  win  any  forward  achievement  through  control  of  a  party 
means  that  you  must  have  at  least  a  majority  of  that  party. 
Then  there  is  against  you  the  minority  of  that  party  and  the 
whole  of  the  opposition  party.  If  your  object  is  anti-political, 
the  only  influence  more  demoralizing  than  to  have  one  party 
"platform"  for  you  is  to  have  both  big  parties  insert  "planks" 
in  favor  of  your  project.  Then  you  are  foreclosed  against 
fighting,  and  there  are  a  thousand  political  ways  of  "doing 
nothing"  in  all  things  save  those  in  which  the  politicians  and 
their  system  are  better  served  by  action. 

But  this  independent,  balance  of  power  position  would  give 
power,  in  the  interest  of  the  public,  to  the  smallest  possible 
number.  Under  the  existing  plurality  system,  which,  of  course, 
is  wrong  in  principle,  a  few  hundred  citizens,  through  their 
votes  and  influence,  could  control  the  elections  in  a  majority 
of  districts. 

The  principle  of  the  balance  of  power  would  fail,  however, 
if  applied  only  in  elections.  It  must  be  extended  also  to  legis- 
lation. Therefore  the  exercise  of  this  independent,  anti- 
political  influence  in  elections  must  be  directed  to  definite 
objects  to  be  carried  out  in  Congress.  There  should  be  a  con- 
structive program  which  will  be  the  same  for  all  congressional 
districts. 


134  YOUR  CONGRESS 

The  only  purpose  of  these  district,  balance  of  power  branches 
of  the  National  Voters'  League  shall  be  the  election  to  Con- 
gress of  candidates  who  will  intelligently  and  whole-heartedly 
exercise  complete  independence  of  party  organization  and 
machinery  wherever  such  partisanship,  or  bi-partisanship, 
would  in  any  way  conflict  with  the  anti-political  interests  of 
the  public.    There  will  be  no  economic  issues  involved. 

This  platform  of  the  people,  to  be  functioned  by  the  elec- 
tion of  Congressmen  who  will  carry  out  its  principles,  will 
consist  of  only  three  planks: 

1.  The  complete  divorcing  of  patronage  and  legislation. 

2.  The  abolition  of  the  pork  barrel  influence  in  politics  and 
in  legislation  by  the  substitution  of  a  responsible  budget  sys- 
tem for  the  present  method  of  appropriating  public  money. 

3.  The  reconstruction  of  Congress,  institutionally,  politically 
and  along  parliamentary  lines,  according  to  the  principles  out- 
lined in  the  preceding  chapter. 

The  voters'  league  idea  must  be  applied,  both  locally  and 
nationally.  To  guide  the  voters  in  the  choice  of  candidates, 
the  National  Voters'  League  will  report  fully,  but  without 
recommendation,  as  to  the  record  of  each  Congressman  or 
Senator  who  is  a  candidate  for  re-election.  This  information 
must  be  supplemented  by  reports  from  the  local  branches. 
Each  district  voters'  league  should — 

1.  At  the  proper  time  in  congressional  campaigns,  after 
careful  investigation,  issue  a  report  to  the  voters  based  on  the 
local  record  of  all  candidates,  emphasizing  those  without 
Washington  records,  and  recommending  the  candidate  who 
should  be  supported. 

2.  In  cases  where  none  of  the  candidates  are  of  the  right 
character,  a  district  league  should  undertake  to  bring  into 
the  field  a  suitable  candidate. 

3.  The  district  league  should  in  no  case  recommend  nor  give 
support  to  any  candidate  not  in  favor  of  the  anti-spoils  plat- 
form outlined  above. 


YOUR  CONGRESS  135 

To  organize  the  country  along  these  Hnes  will  be  a  tremen- 
dous task.  Under  the  most  favorable  circumstances  con- 
siderable time  will  be  required.  But  the  start  will  be  made  at 
once,  and  with  the  right  measure  of  cooperation  from  the 
public  a  great  deal  can  be  accomplished  in  the  next  two  years. 

The  work  of  the  National  Voters'  League  has  been  in  the 
hands  of  the  following  Executive  Committee : 

Herbert  S.  Bigelow,  Cincinnati. 
Mrs.  Alice  G.  Brandeis,  Boston. 
Mrs.  Elisabeth  G.  Bvans,  Boston. 
Mrs.  Borden  Harriman,  Nezv  York. 
Frederic  C.  Hozve,  Nezv  York. 
V  Charles  H.  Ingersoll,  South  Orange,  N.  J. 
Fred  S.  Jackson,  Topeka. 
Stiles  P.  Jones,  Minneapolis. 
Herbert  Quick,  Berkeley  Springs,  W.  Va. 
Lieut.  C.  P.  Shazv,  Norfolk,  Va. 
John  F.  Sinclair,  Minneapolis. 
Miss  Ida  M.  Tarbell,  Nezv  York. 
William  S.  U'Ren,  Oregon  City, 

Charles  H.  Ingersoll  is  treasurer,  and  Lynn  Haines,  secre- 
tary. The  headquarters  of  the  league  is  in  the  Woodward 
Building,  Washington,  D.  C. 

This  Executive  Committee  is  now  being  reorganized  and  will 
be  increased  to  twenty  members,  divided  into  subcommittees  of 
five  members  each,  as  follows : 

1.  Administration,  having  to  do  with  questions  of  policy 
and  the  work  of  the  headquarters  at  Washington. 

2.  Publicity,  to  have  supervision  over  all  regular  and  special 
publications  of  the  League. 

3.  Organization,  for  the  development  and  functioning  of 
the  movement. 

4.  Finance,  for  the  support  of  the  work. 


136  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Similarly  it  is  proposed  that  each  "Balance  of  Power" 
League  in  the  congressional  districts  shall  be  governed  by  an 
executive  committee  consisting  of  one  member  from  each 
county  in  the  district  and  one  chosen  at  large,  who  shall  be 
chairman.  The  chairmen  of  these  district  organizations  shall 
make  up  an  advisory  council  of  the  National  Voters'  League. 

All  questions  of  policy  and  the  election  of  the  Executive 
Committee  of  the  National  Voters'  League  shall  be  submitted 
to  a  referendum  vote,  first  to  the  Advisory  Council,  and  then 
to  the  whole  membership  of  the  League. 

The  problem  of  adequately  financing  this  movement  is  one 
of  the  greatest  importance.  For  the  present  the  publicity  and 
organization  work  of  the  National  Voters'  League  cannot 
be  sustained  alone  by  the  income  from  one  dollar  a  year  mem- 
bers, although  it  is  expected  that  this  source  of  support  will 
be  sufficient  after  a  few  years.  An  effort  is  being  made  to 
obtain  more  substantial  financial  help  from  all  who  are  inter- 
ested in  the  fulfillment  of  its  objects. 

You  can  assist  the  National  Voters'  League  by  becoming 
a  subscriber  to  its  regular  monthly  bulletin,  The  Searchlight 
on  Congress;  by  helping  to  circulate  this  little  book;  and  by 
special  contributions  to  supplement  the  income  from  those 
sources. 

In  turn,  the  National  Voters'  League  will  aid  you  in  every 
possible  way  by  giving  accurate  and  timely  information  con- 
cerning the  all-important  business  of  the  public,  which  is  your 
business. 


I 


APPENDIX 

In  this  attempt  to  tabulate  a  number  of  roll  calls  sufficient  to  aid 
the  public  in  comprehending  both  the  sham  and  the  real  in  the  situa- 
tions described  in  Chapter  III,  the  difficulty  has  been  twofold. 

First,  record  votes  of  importance  are  few  and  far  between.  The  bi- 
partisan leaders  have  so  firm  a  hold  upon  the  machinery  of  the  House 
and  operate  through  such  a  clever  parliamentary  system  that  determina- 
tive roll  calls  in  that  body  hardly  exist.  Practically  all  issues  are 
decided  either  in  the  majority  party  caucus  or  in  the  Committee  of 
the  Whole,  in  neither  of  which  the  attitude  of  members  is  recorded 
officially.  At  other  times,  on  crucial  questions,  members,  by  concerted 
refusal  to  demand  roll  calls,  deliberately  dodge  the  responsibility  of 
an  open  vote. 

Second,  the  few  roll  calls  that  are  recorded  in  the  House  rarely 
reveal  the  real  attitude  and  inclination  of  members.  Almost  without 
exception,  House  roll  calls  are  either  partisan  or  political.  Purely 
partisan  roll  calls — those  votes  which  reflect  a  blind  servility  to  party 
organization  and  leadership,  a  harking  back  to  the  days  when  party 
pride  and  prejudice  were  everything — will  require  no  explanation.  A 
good  illustration  of  votes  for  "home  consumption,"  or  political  effect, 
can  be  found  in  the  history  of  the  lobby  investigation  in  the  House. 
When  the  appointment  of  a  committee  to  investigate  the  Mulhall 
charges  of  corruption  against  members  was  first  considered,  the 
House  decided,  without  a  roll  call,  not  to  give  that  committee  the 
authority  to  employ  an  attorney  or  attorneys  to  aid  the  inquiry.  This 
recordless  action  looked  like  fear  that  an  investigation  in  the  hands 
of  any  not  carefully  chosen  for  the  task  might  be  carried  too  far.  But 
on  the  following  legislative  day,  after  the  leaders  had  had  an  opportu- 
nity to  ascertain  who  zvere  to  be  named  on  the  committee  and  that 
they  were  not  likely  to  employ  special  counsel,  the  House,  this  time 
in  a  record  vote,  reversed  itself  and  decided  that  the  committee  might 
at  its  discretion  get  legal  help.  This  roll  call,  although  appearing  to 
the  uninitiated  as  evidence  that  the  House  wanted  the  whole  truth  of 
the  Mulhall  charges,  really  means  next  to  nothing.  And  that  is  too 
generally  the  case  with  House  roll  calls. 

You  will  find  in  the  following  tabulation  fifteen  roll  calls.  The 
first  six  are  "deadly  parallels,"  showing  how  members  voted,  at  differ- 
ent times  and  under  different  political  conditions,  on  exactly  the  same 
issues.  The  next  four  represent  crises  during  the  period  of  the  anti- 
Cannon  revolt.  The  last  five  reveal  the  bi-partisan  combination  in 
the  Sixty-third  Congress. 

137 


138  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Gag  Rules — A  Parallel. — In  the  Sixty-first  Congress  the  Republicans 
were  supremely  in  control  of  the  proceedings  of  the  House.  On 
April  5,  1909,  page  1119,  John  Dalzell,  chairman  of  the  Committee  on 
Rules,  presented  a  "gag"  rule  typical  of  those  Cannon  days.  It  limited 
debate  and  prevented  amendments  to  the  Payne-Aldrich  tariff  bill. 
It  was  adopted,  195  to  178,  with  15  not  voting  (1),  On  this  occasion 
Mr.  Underwood  pleaded  for  a  rule  by  which  the  House  could  act 
upon  the  tariff  "item  by  item;"  Mr.  Fitzgerald  referred  to  "the  sys- 
tem of  tyrannical  rules;"  and  Mr.  Clark  (now  Speaker)  characterized 
this  rule  as  "unjust,  unfair,  un-American  and  preposterous."  The 
Democrats  were  then  "progressive"  on  the  rules. 

In  the  Sixty-third  Congress  the  House  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
Democrats.  On  April  21,  1913,  page  299,  Chairman  Henry,  of  the 
Rules  Committee,  reported  a  typical  Democratic  "gag"  rule.  It  pro- 
vided for  the  passage  of  the  sundry  civil  appropriation  bill,  involving 
$116,795,327,  and  allowed  only  forty  minutes  of  debate,  no  opportunity 
for  amendment,  even  under  the  five-minute  rule,  a>nd  no  motion  to 
recommit.  It  was  charged  in  the  discussion,  and  not  disputed,  that  this 
rule  was  a  verbatim  copy  of  one  formerly  drawn  and  used  by  the  old 
Republican  organization.  It  was  adopted,  221  to  110,  with  101  not 
voting  (2). 

These  two  roll  calls — columns  1  and  2 — illustrate  how  little  reliance 
can  be  placed  in  party  protestations  in  reference  to  the  rules. 

The  Cullop  Amendment. — The  next  two  roll  calls — those  in  the 
columns  marked  3  and  4 — relate  to  attempts  to  incorporate  in  a  judi- 
cial bill  a  provision  requiring  the  President  to  make  public  the  recom- 
mendations upon  which  he  based  the  appointment  of  federal  judges. 
The  question  came  up  first  in  the  Sixty-second  Congress.  On  Janu- 
ary 24,  1912,  page  1287,  Mr.  Cullop,  of  Indiana,  offered  this  publicity 
amendment  to  a  general  judicial  bill:  * 

That  hereafter,  before  the  President  shall  appoint  any  district,  circuit,  or  supreme 
judge,  he  shall  make  public  all  indorsements  made  in  behalf  of  any  applicant. 

The  Cullop  amendment  was  adopted  by  the  House,  151  to  85,  with 
155  not  voting  (column  3).  In  view  of  what  happened  later  it  is 
obvious  that  many  of  the  Democrats  who  voted  for  the  publicity 
provision  in  1912,  were  playing  politics  by  seeking  to  embarrass  a 
Republican  President.  (It  will  be  remembered  that  the  thirteen 
Democrats  who  opposed  the  Cullop  amendment  in  1912  were  roundly 
roasted  by  Mr.  Bryan.) 

The  same  issue  was  presented  in  the  last  Congress,  with  the  political 
situation    exactly    reversed.      This    time    the    Republicans    sought    the 


YOUR  CONGRESS  139 

embarrassment  of  a  Democratic  administration  by  voting  quite  gen- 
erally for  the  amendment,  while  eighty  Democrats  repudiated  their 
former  position  by  voting  against  the  amendment.  On  May  10,  1913, 
page  1477,  the  House,  by  a  vote  of  171  to  84  with  175  not  voting 
(column  4),  adopted  the  so-called  Cullop  amendment  to  the  Phila- 
delphia judgeship  bill,  the  amendment  here  being  presented  by  Republi- 
can leader  James  R.  Mann,  who  voted  against  his  own  proposal. 

These  roll  calls,  one  in  the  Sixty-second  and  one  in  the  Sixty-third 
Congress,  are  here  placed  in  parallel  columns  so  that  the  public  may 
see  the  inconsistency  of  many  members.  This  issue  reached  two  other 
roll  calls  besides  those  given,  and  of  the  membership  of  the  last  House, 
115  voted  on  both  sides.  This  furnishes  one  of  the  best  illustrations 
of  pohtical  voting. 

In  both  columns — 3  and  4 — "a"  indicates  a  vote  in  favor  of  the  Cullop 
publicity  amendment. 

Panama  Canal  Tolls. — There  is  further  inconsistency,  or  lack  of 
conviction,  or  responsiveness  to  leadership,  exemplified  in  the  two 
votes  recorded  on  the  question  of  Panama  Canal  tolls.  The  Doremus 
amendment  to  the  canal  bill,  which  was  adopted  by  the  House  May  23, 
1912,  page  7019,  by  a  vote  of  147  to  128,  with  117  not  voting  (5), 
exempted  American  coastwise  vessels  from  the  payment  of  tolls.  The 
same  issue  came  before  the  House  March  31,  1914,  page  6323,  when 
the  tolls  exemption  law  was  repealed,  247  to  162,  with  twenty-three 
not  voting  (6).  Of  the  266  Congressmen  who  were  members  in  1912, 
forty  voted  one  way  on  the  tolls  question  in  1912  and  took  the  opposite 
side  of  the  same  issue  in  1914. 

In  both  columns — 5  and  6 — "a"  indicates  a  vote  for  free  tolls. 

The  Democrats  Save  Cannon. — The  real  crisis  in  which  was  seen  the 
beginning  of  the  present  bi-partisan  combination  has  been  described. 
This  was  at  the  time  of  the  adoption  of  the  rules  of  the  Sixty-first 
Congress,  when  Mr.  Fitzgerald  led  a  Democratic  group  to  the  support 
of  Speaker  Cannon.  "A"  in  this  column  (No.  7)  indicates  a  vote  for 
the  Fitzgerald  amendment. 

The  N orris  Resolution  (8). — Later  in  that  Congress,  on  March  19, 
1910,  page  3436, '  the  deserting  Democrats  voted  with  all  the  other 
anti-Cannonites  for  the  Norris  resolution,  which  increased  the  rules 
committee  and  eliminated  the  Speaker  from  it.  This  was  the  much 
discussed  victory  over  the  Republican  machine.  The  Norris  resolution 
was  adopted,  191  to  156,  with  42  not  voting.  An  "a"  indicates  an 
affirmative  vote. 


140  YOUR  CONGRESS 

To  Vacate  the  Speakers  Chair  (9). — The  Fitzgerald  Democrats  may 
have  supported  the  Norris  resolution  thinking  that  it  would  be  followed 
by  the  removal  of  Mr.  Cannon  and  the  election  of  a  Democratic 
speaker.  The  attempt  to  depose  Cannon  was  made  on  the  same  day 
(page  3438),  but  it  failed  because  several  insurgent  Republicans  voted 
against  the  motion  to  vacate  the  Speaker's  chair,  thus  saving  Mr.  Can- 
non in  that  crisis.  This  vote.  155  to  192,  with  41  not  voting,  is  given 
in  column  9.  An  "a"  indicates  a  vote  in  favor  of  declaring  the 
Speaker's  chair  vacant. 

The  Ballinger-Pinchot  Controversy. — Another  significant  roll  call 
in  that  Congress  occurred  January  7,  1910,  page  404,  on  the  question 
of  taking  the  appointment  of  the  committee  to  investigate  the  Depart- 
ment of  the  Interior  and  Bureau  of  Forestry  (the  Ballinger-Pinchot 
matter)  out  of  the  hands  of  Speaker  Cannon  and  having  that  com- 
mittee elected  by  the  House.  This  amendment  carried,  149  to  146. 
with  92  not  voting.  In  column  10,  "a"  indicates  a  vote  in  favor  of 
electing  the  committee. 

These  four  roll  calls  in  the  Cannon  period  show  not  only  the  incep- 
tion of  bi-partisanship  as  a  machine,  but  the  personnel  of  the  original 
insurgents. 

It  can  readily  be  seen  that  none  of  the  roll  calls  already  described  are 
very  reliable.  They  are  too  full  of  partisanship  and  politics.  They  are 
chiefly  useful  in  so  far  as  they  serve  to  point  out  those  members  whose 
conduct  indicates  that  they  are  primarily  politicians.  But  the  next 
five  columns  of  the  tabulation  contain  as  many  record  votes  which 
more  generally  reflect  the  bi-partisan  combination  on  one  side  and  the 
independent  members  on  the  other.  These  roll  calls  are  the  most 
important  to  be  found  in  the  history  of  the  last  Congress. 

To  Clear  Calendar  Wednesday  (11). — Students  of  the  procedure  of 
the  House  know  that  the  bi-partisan  leaders  can  control  directly  the 
activities  of  all  daily  sessions,  excepting  those  on  Calendar  Wednes- 
days. Privileged  business  or  special  orders,  always  in  the  hands  of 
the  leaders,  have  the  right  of  way  over  all  ordinary  matters.  But 
Calendar  Wednesday  was  supposed  to  be  above  and  beyond  manipula- 
tion. That  was  intended  to  be  one  day  each  week  on  which  nothing 
could  prevent  the  consideration  of  bills  reported  from  committee. 
However,  through  unfortunate  chance  or  deliberate  manipulation.  Cal- 
endar Wednesday  was  "log-jammed"  in  the  Sixty-third  Congress  by  a 
comparatively  unimportant  bill  upon  which  the  politicians  filibustered 
for  eleven  weeks.  The  only  explainable  object  of  this  filibuster  was 
to  prevent  the  reaching  of   a  number  of  vital  matters,   such  as  the 


YOUR  CONGRESS  141 

presidential  primary  bill,  safety  at  sea  legislation,  various  labor  bills, 
rural  credits  legislation,  the  national  prohibition  amendment,  woman 
suffrage,  etc.  To  break  this  long  filibuster  and  restore  to  Calendar 
Wednesday  its  functions,  a  motion  was  made  April  22,  1914,  page 
7636,  to  drop  consideration  of  the  judicial  code  bill,  which  was  the 
buffer.  This  motion  was  defeated,  115  to  167,  with  151  not  voting  (11). 
Those  voting  "aye"  were  against  the  filibuster  and  in  favor  of  ending 
the  further  abuse  of  Calendar  Wednesday.  As  indicating  a  fairly 
clear-cut  division  among  those  members  who  wanted  action  and  the 
bi-partisan  machine  obstructionists,  this  roll  call  is  one  of  the  most 
valuable  in  the  last  Congress. 

The  Fitzgerald  Salary  Amendment  (12). — Heretofore  the  salaries 
of  the  legislative,  executive  and  judicial  officers  of  the  National  Gov- 
ernment have  been  fixed  by  statutes;  and  appropriation  bills,  at  least 
in  so  far  as  salary  increases  were  concerned,  could  not  disregard  the 
figures  named  in  existing  law.  But,  at  the  eleventh  hour  in  the  con- 
sideration of  the  Legislative,  Executive  and  Judicial  appropriation  bill, 
Mr.  Fitzgerald  offered  an  amendment  repealing  all  laws  relating  to 
salaries  appropriated  for  in  the  measure  and  making  the  provisions  of 
that  measure  the  substantive  law  on  the  subject.  In  other  words. 
Congress  could,  under  this  amendment,  change  the  salaries  of  Congress- 
men, Senators  and  other  federal  officials  without  having  the  changes 
subject  to  points  of  order  and  in  a  way  vastly  less  public  than  when 
it  had  to  be  done  through  separate,  bona  fide  bills.  This  amendment 
added  greatly  to  the  already  powerful  political  and  legislative  influence 
of  the  Committee  on  Appropriations.  It  established  a  dangerous 
precedent.  The  Fitzgerald  amendment  was  adopted  on  April  17,  1914, 
page  7372,  by  a  vote  of  193  to  136,  with  102  not  voting  (12).  An  "a" 
means, a  vote  in  favor  of  its  adoption.  As  in  the  case  of  the  attempt 
to  break  the  filibusterers'  hold  upon  Calendar  Wednesday,  this  roll 
call  is  a  highly  important  test.  The  leaders  of  both  old  parties  and  the 
bi-partisan  machine  were  for  the  proposal,  while  the  progressives 
and  the  independents  of  all  parties  who  understood  the  issue  were 
opposed  to  the  change. 

The  Whaley  Case  (13). — In  column  13  will  be  found  another  sample 
of  the  working  together  of  Democratic  and  Republican  "organizations." 
This  is  the  roll  call  in  which  the  House  refused  to  investigate  seemingly 
well-authenticated  charges  of  corruption  in  the  election  of  Richard  S. 
Whaley,  of  South  Carolina.  The  charges  were  made  by  Mayor  John 
P.  Grace,  of  Charleston,  who,  at  his  own  expense,  brought  witnesses 
to  Washington  and  collected  a  mass  of  evidence  against  the  validity 
of  Whaley's  election.     Mayor  Grace  had  not  been  a  candidate  against 


142  YOUR  CONGRESS 

Mr.  Whaley,  but  sought  the  investigation  as  a  citizen.  The  Committee 
on  Elections,  No.  1,  in  a  manner  which  suggests  how  Tammany  used 
Sulzer  as  an  example  and  a  warning,  turned  the  investigation  against 
Mayor  Grace  and  thereby  appeared  to  serve  notice  on  people  in  the 
South  that  it  was  not  safe  to  interfere  in  such  matters.  The  point 
to  the  incident  is  that  it  discloses  the  lack  of  teeth  in  the  federal 
corrupt  practices  act.  In  each  district  where  the  election  to  Congress 
is  virtually  decided  in  the  primary  and  not  the  regular  election,  as  is 
the  case  throughout  practically  all  of  the  South,  the  defeated  candidate 
in  the  primary  is  not  recognized  nor  given  rights  before  Congress 
as  is  done  with  a  candidate  defeated  in  the  November  election.  When 
a  defeated  candidate  in  the  regular  election  desires  to  bring  a  contest 
for  a  seat  in  Congress,  the  way  is  open  before  him ;  he  has  a  well- 
established  standing;  his  rights  and  interests  are  safeguarded;  his 
contest  expenses  are  paid  by  the  House.  But  the  candidate  defeated 
in  a  primary  must  prosecute  a  contest  at  private  expense  and  with 
obstacles  at  every  turn;  or  interested  individuals  must  face  the  same 
handicap,  as  did  Mayor  Grace  in  this  case.  In  truth,  the  federal 
corrupt  practices  act  hardly  applies  in  those  sections  of  the  country 
where  there  is  dominance  by  a  single  party.  In  the  South  particularly 
it  would  seem  as  though  primary  election  corruption  can  be  carried 
on  with  practical  assurance  of  immunity  so  far  as  Congress  is 
concerned. 

In  this  roll  call  on  the  Whaley  case  the  House  voted  to  reindorse 
that  condition,  as  had  been  done  in  the  passage  of  the  corrupt  practices 
act  without  specific  provisions  for  the  correction  of  primary  election 
frauds.  James  A.  Frear,  a  member  of  Elections  Committee  No.  1, 
presented  a  minority  report  and  a  resolution  for  an  investigation. 
This  resolution  was  defeated  on  January  27,  1914,  page  2487,  by  a  vote 
of  98  to  227,  with  108  not  voting. 

In  this  column — 13 — an  "a"  indicates  a  vote  in  favor  of  the  investi- 
gation. 

The  Underwood  Cotton  futures  Amendment. — Another  significant 
roll  call  occurred  on  September  30,  1913,  page  5288.  The  Senate  had 
adopted  a  provision  in  the  tariff  bill,  known  as  the  Clarke  amendment, 
which  struck  at  gambling  in  cotton  futures.  In  the  House,  Mr.  Under- 
wood offered  an  amendment  which  greatly  modified  the  Clarke  amend- 
ment and,  it  was  charged  in  the  debate,  carried  recognition  and  regula- 
tion of  stock  gambling  in  cotton  so  far  as  in  effect  to  be  a  step  toward 
legalization  of  it.  Afterward,  as  was  to  be  expected,  in  the  contro- 
versy between  the  House  and  Senate  over  the  Clarke  amendment  and 
the   Underwood   substitute,   all   legislation   on   the   subject   of   cotton 


YOUR  CONGRESS  143 

futures  failed.  By  a  vote  of  171  to  161,  with  96  not  voting  (14), 
the  House  adopted  the  Underwood  cotton  futures  amendment.  An  "a" 
indicates  a  vote  for  the  Underwood  amendment. 

To  Displace  District  Day  (15). — A  roll  call,  somewhat  similar  in 
significance  to  that  when  the  attempt  was  made  to  shake  Calendar 
Wednesday  free  of  the  filibuster,  occurred  on  June  8,  1914,  page  10827. 
The  rules  give  two  Mondays  of  each  month  to  bills  relating  to  the 
District  of  Columbia.  That  calendar  then  contained  bills  of  very 
great  importance,  such  as  the  Buchanan  bill  to  amend  the  building  law 
to  safeguard  the  lives  of  workmen,  while  the  Grosser  bill  providing 
for  municipal  ownership  of  the  street  railways  of  Washington  had 
been  reported  from  the  committee.  Seemingly  to  prevent  the  reaching 
of  such  bills  a  motion  was  made  to  displace  District  Day  on  the  Mon- 
day named  above.  This  motion  was  carried  by  a  vote  of  202  to  64,  with 
167  not  voting.  In  this  column — 15 — an  "a"  indicates  a  vote  in  favor 
of  displacing  District  Day. 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n- Negative  vote 
p-Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

Alabama 

1 

1 

■s 

1 

m 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

(5 

6 

5^ 

L 
1- 

3 

s 

s 
L 

•|2 

"3 

s 
Si 

1- 

a 

6 

4J 

II 
Is 

1 

c32 

11 
II 

o 

11 

a)  g 

J" 

s 

iJ 

II 

Id  <u 

11 

1 

k 

II 

ll 

t3 
1 

s 

i 

1 

G.  W.  Taylor..... 

D 

1897 

n 

a 

o 

o 

a 

o 

n 

o 

O 

a 

° 

o 

n 

a 

0 

2 

S.  H.  Dent.  Jr.... 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

- 

n 

n 

n 

a 

3 

H.  D.  Clayton.... 

D 

1897 

n 

a 

a 

P 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

o 

n 

n 

4 

F.  L.  Blackmon.. 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 
o 

a 

n 

n 
n 

n 
a 

a 

5 

J.  T.  Heflin 

D 

1904 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

o 

o 

a 

6 

R.  P.  Hobson.... 

D 

1907 

n 

o 

o 

o 

a 

o 

n    1    a 

a 

o 

o 

a 

o 

n 

o 

7 

J.  L.  Burnett 

^ 

1899 

n 

a 

o 

n 

a 

o 

n 

^ 

a 

a 

o 

" 

° 

a 

n 

8 

C.  C.  Harris 

D 

1914 

1 



9 

0.  W.  Underwood. 

1^ 

1895 

n 

a 

a 

n 

a 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

J.  W.  Abercrombie 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

. 

Arizona 

1 

Carl  Hayden 

D 

1912 

a 

.... 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 



Arkansas 

1 

T.  H.  Caraway... 

° 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

2 

W.A.  Oldfield.... 

° 

1909 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

3 

J.  C.  Floyd 

D 

1905 

n 

^ 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

° 

n 

" 

a 

4 

Otis  Wingo 

D 

1913 

.... 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

5 

H.  M.  Jacoway... 

D 

1911 



a 

a 

a 

n 

" 

a 

n 

n 

n 

6 

S.  M.  Taylor 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

H 

.... 

7 

W.  S.  Goodwin... 

D 

1911 

o 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

o 

o 

0 

.  . . . 

California 

1 

Wm.  Kent 

I 

1911 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

o 

o 

a 
a 

n 
a 

O 

2 

J.  E.  Raker 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

3 

C.  F.  Curry 

R 

1913 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

4 

Julius  Kahn 

R 

1905 

a 

n 

n 

0 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

o 

•S 

J.I.  Nolan 

P 

1903 

a 

a 



a 

a 

n 

a 

o 

o 

6 

J.  R.  Knowland.. 

R 

1904 

a 

o 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

o 

a 

n 

o 

7 

D.  S.  Church 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

o 

a 

a 

8 

E.A.Hayes 

R 

1905 

a 

n 

n 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

M 

144 


I 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p- Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

1 
c 

g 

1 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

.0 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

1 

6 

1 

•Ha 
Q 

1 

a 

o 

a 
o 

a 

1 

o 

+1   Ui 

II 

1 

q2 

1 

p 

N   C 

s  a 

o 

as 

1 

w  o 

■ll 

CO 

i 

eS5 

•s'a 

II 
^3 

I. 

H 

! 

>..SP 

II 

2a 

SI 

Si 

.a 

Q 
1 

Q 

C.  W.  Bell 

P 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

n 

10 

W.  D.  Stephens.  . 

P 

1911 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

o 

n 

a 

n 

n 

11 

Vv'm.  Kettner 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

Colorado 

1 

G.J.  Kindel 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

o 

? 

H.  H.  Seldomridge 

D 
D 

1913 

a 

o 

n 

a 

a 

o 

a 

a 

E.T.Taylor...,. 

1909 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

Edw.  Keating 

° 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

o 

o 

o 

Connecticut 

1 

A.  Lonergan 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

?, 

B.  F.  Mahan 

D 

1913 



o 

o 

a 

o 

a 

o 

a 

o 

.... 

3 

T.  L.  Reilly 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

n 

o 

o 

a 

a 

4 

J.  Donovan 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

5 

Wm.  Kennedy 

D 

1913 



a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

Delaware 

F.  Brockson 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

.... 

a 

n 

o 

P 

a 

o 

Florida 

1 

S.  M .  Sparkman .  . 

D 

1895 

n 

a 

o 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

o 

o 

n 

a 

o 

? 

F.  Clark 

D 

190.S 

n 

a 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

P 

P 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

o 

3 

E.  Wilson 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

o 

0 

n 

n 

a 

4 

C.  L'Engle 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

Georgia 

1 

C.  G.  Edwards... 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

o 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

a 

2 

F.  Park 

D 

1913 

n 

n 

n 

n 

3 

C.  R.  Crisp 

D 
D 

1913 

a 

a 

o 

.  . .  . 

o 

o 

n 

a 

o 

4 

W.  C.  Adamson.  . 

1897 

n 

a 

P 

P 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

o 

a 

5 

W.  S.  Howard.... 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

6 

C.  L,  Bartlett.... 

D 

1895 

n 

a 

P 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

7 

G.  Lee 

D 

1905 

n 

" 

1^ 

n 

n 

" 

a 

a 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

a 

145 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p- Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

bo 

.s 

1 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

1 

Q 

1 

.a 

1 
& 
Pi 

Pi 

1 

L 
1 

o 

4^ 
C 

1 

o 

il 

St 

as 

I:. 

c3S 

Is 
Is 

o 

ii 

e3^ 

rtON 
HO 

II 

M 

II 

1. 
II 

II 

1 

.i2 

Q 

i 

O  nj 

HQ 

8 

S.  J.  Tribble 

D 

1911 

.... 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

9 

T.  M.Bell 

D 

1905 

n 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

10 

T.  W.  Hardwick.. 

D 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

^ 

o 

o 

n 

a 

o 

11 

J.R.Walker 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

.... 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

12 

D.  M.  Hughes.... 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

Idaho 

1 

B.  L.  French 

R 

1911 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

2 

A.  T.  Smith 

R 

1913 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

Illinois 

1 

M.  B.  Madden. .  . 

R 

1905 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

o 

a 

2 

J.  R.  Mann 

R 

1897 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

P 

a 

n 

o 

a 

3 

G.  E.  Gorman 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

4 

J.  T.  McDermott. 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

P 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

5 

A.  J.  Sabath 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

n 

6 

J.  McAndrews 

D 

1913 

n 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

1 

7 

F.  Buchanan 

D 

1911 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

8 

T.  Gallagher 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

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a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

a 

o 

Q 

F.  A.  Britten 

R 

1913 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

10 

C.  M.  Thomson.. 

P 

1913 

n 

o 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

11 

Ira  C.  Copley.... 

P 

1911 

o 

o 

a 

o 

n 

o 

o 

a 

n 

o 

1? 

W.  H.  Hinebaugh. 

P 

1913 

n 

a 

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o 

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n 

n 

IS 

J.  C.  McKenzie. . . 

R 

1911 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

o 

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14 

C.  H.  Tavenner.  . 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

IS 

S.  A.  Hoxworth. . . 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

o 

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C.  U,  Stone 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

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17 

L,  Fitz  Henry 

D 

1913 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

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18 

F.  T.  O'Hair 

D 

1913 

a 

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n 

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n 

n 

n 

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C.  M.  Borchers... 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

a 

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20 

H.  T.  Rainey 

D 

1903 

n 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

* 

a 

o 

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n 

a 

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146 

> 

a- Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p-Answered 

present 
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1 

1 

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1 

1 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

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D 

1909 

n 

o 

o 

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n 

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n 

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n 

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W.  N.  Baltz 

D 

1913 



o 

n 

n 

a 

n 

n 

23 

M.  D.  Foster 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

a 

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n 

n 

n 

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D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

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n 

P 

n 

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R.  P.  Hill 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

W.E.Williams... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

L.  B.  Stringer.... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

Indiana 

1 

Chas.  Lieb 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

.... 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

2 

W.  A.  Cullop 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

3 

Wm.  E.  Cox 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

0 

a 

4 

L.  Dixon 

D 

1905 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

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o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

5 

R.  W.  Moss 

D 

1909 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

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n 

o 

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6 

F.  H.  Gray 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

n 

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P 

n 

n 

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7 

C.  A.  Korbly 

D 

1909 

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a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

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P 

a 

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o 

o 

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0 

8 

J.  A.  M.  Adair.  .  . 

D 

1907 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

o 

a 

9 

M.  A.  Morrison... 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

o 

10 

J.  B.  Peterson.... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

" 

o 

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n 

o 

11 

G.  W.  Ranch 

D 

1907 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

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n 

o 

n 

a 

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C.  Cline 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

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n 

n 

n 

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P 

13 

H.  A.  Barnhart... 

D 

1908 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

o 

Iowa 

1 

C.  A.  Kennedy... 

R 

1907 

a 

n 

o 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

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H.  Vollmer 

D 

1914 

n 

n 

o 

s 

M.  Connolly 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

.  n 

n 

n 

4 

G.  N.  Haugen..  .. 

R 

1899 

n 

n 

o 

0 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

o 

n 

a 

n 

a 

5 

J.  W.  Good 

R 

1909 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

6 

S.  Kirkpatrick. . . . 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

o 

7 

S.  F.  Prouty 

R 

1911 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

o 

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o 

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147 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p-Answered 

present 
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bo 

II 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

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n 

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W.  R.  Green 

R1911 

.... 

n 

n 

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n 

n 

1 

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IC 

F.  P.  Woods 

R1909 

n 

n 

a 

0 

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n 

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a 

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n 

a 

n 

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11 

Geo.  C.  Scott 

R1912 

n 

a 

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Kansas 

1 

D.R.Anthony,  Jr. 

R1907 

a 

o 

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n 

o 

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n 
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9 

J.  Taggart 

D1911 

.... 

a 

a 

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n 

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P.  P.  Campbell. .  .  ] 

R  1903 

a 

n 

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n 

n 

n 

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4 

D.  Doolittle Il 

31913 

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G.  T.  Helvering.  .  ] 

3  1913 

... 

a 

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n 

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6 

J.  R.  Connelly....  I 

3l913j....|    a 

a 

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G.  A.  Neeley I 

3  1912  .... 

a 

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V.  Murdock ] 

P1903 

n 

n 

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f 

A.  W.  Barkley....  I 

)  1913 

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a 

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n 

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n 

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A.  O.Stanley I 

)1903 

n 

o 

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n 

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R.  Y.  Thomas.  Jr.  I 

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n 

a 

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n 

n 

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a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

n 

4 

Ben  Johnson I 

)1907 

n 

a 

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0 

n 

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n 

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o 

n 

n 

a 

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5 

S.  Sherley I 

)1903 

n 

a 

n 

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n 

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A.  B.  Rouse E 

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a 

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n 

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7 

J.  C.  Cantrill E 

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n 

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n 

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8 

H.  Helm E 

)1907 

n 

a 

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10. 

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D.  Powers B 

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1897 

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present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

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2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

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D 

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W.  Elder 

D 
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1913 

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L.  L,  Morgan .... 

1912 

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7 

L.  Lazaro 

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J.  B.  Aswell 

D 

1913 

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1911 

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n 

n 

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3 

J.  A.  Peters 

R 

1913 

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a 

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4 

P.  E.  Guernsey... 

R 

1908 

a 

n 

n 

o 

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a 

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n 

n 

n 

o 

o 

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n 

o 

Maryland 

1 

J.  H.  Covington . . 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

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p 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

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2 

J.  P.  C.  Talbott.. 

D 

1903 

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o 

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n 

n 

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n 

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3 

C.  P.  Coady 

D 

1913 

n 

o 

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4 

J.  C.  Linthicum .  . 

D 

1911 

o 

a 

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n 

o 

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5 

P.  0.  Smith 

D 

1913 

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6 

D.  J.  Lewis 

D 

1911 

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Massachusetts 

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A.  T.  Tread  way. . 

R 

1913 

n 

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P.  H.  Gillett 

R 

1893 

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n 

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3 

C.  D.  Paige 

R 

1913 

a 

a 

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n 

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4 

S.  E.  Winslow. . . . 

R 

1913 

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o 

a 

a 

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n 

o 

5 

J.  J.  Rogers 

R 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

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6 

A.  P.  Gardner.... 

R 

1902 

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n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

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n 

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7 

M.  F.  Phelan 

D 

1913 

a 

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n 

o 

n 

a        o 

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8 

P.  S.  Deitrick. .  .  . 

D 

1913 



a 

a 

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n 

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9 

E.  W.  Roberts. . . . 

R 

1899 

a 

n 

o 

o 

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n 

n 

n 

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n 

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10 

W.  P.  Murray.... 

D 

1911 

a 

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n 

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11 

A.J.  Peters 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

n 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

n 

a 

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149 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n- Negative  vote 
p-Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

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2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

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J.  A.  Gallivan. . . . 

D 

1914 

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13 

J.J.  Mitchell 

D 

1913 

a 

^ 

n 

a 

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a 

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14 

E.  Gilmore 

D 

1913 

a 

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n 

o 

a 

n 

a 

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15 

W.  S.  Greene 

R 

1898 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

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n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

16 

T.  C.  Thacher.... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

Michigan 

1 

F.  E.  Doremus... 

D 

1911 

o 

a 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

o 

o 

2 

S.  W.  Beakes 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

a 

a 

3 

J.  M.  C.  Smith... 

R 

1911 

n 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

a 

4 

E.  L.  Hamilton. . . 

R 

1897 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

5 

C.E.  Mapes 

R 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

6 

S.  W.  Smith 

R 

1897 

a 

n 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

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7 

L.  C.  Cramton.  .  . 

R 

1913 

n 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

8 

J.  W.  Fordney.... 

R 

1899 

a 

n 

o 

o 

o 

o 

a 

n 

n 

o 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

9 

J.  C.  McLaughlin. 

R 

1907 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

o 

a 

10 

R.  0.  Woodruff. . . 

P 

1913 

n 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

11 

P.  0.  Lindquist.. . 

R 

1913 

n 

o 

a 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

.... 

1? 

W.  J.  MacDonald. 

P 

1913 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

P.  H.  Kelley 

R 

1913 

n 

° 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

Minnesota 

1 

S.  Anderson 

R 

1911 

n 

^ 

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n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

o 

2 

W.  S.  Hammond. . 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

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3 

C.  R.  Davis 

R 

1903 

a 

n 

a 

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n 

n 

n 

a 

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F.  C.  Stevens 

R 

1897 

a 

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o 

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n 

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5 

G.  R.  Smith 

R 

1913 

n 

a 

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a 

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n 

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6 

C.  A.  Lindbergh... 

R 

1907 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

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n 

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7 

A.J.Volstead.... 

R 

1903 

a 

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^ 

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n 

n 

n 

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a 

8 

C.  B.  Miller 

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1909 

a 

n 

a 

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n 

n 

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n 

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n 

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9 

H.  Steenerson .... 

R 

1903 

a 

P 

a 

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n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

150 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n- Negative  vote 
p-Answered 

present 
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2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

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1 

E,  S.  Candler,  Jr.. 

D 

1901 

n 

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a 

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n 

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n 

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2 

H.  D.  Stephens... 

D 

1911 

a 

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n 

n 

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3 

B.  G.  Humphreys. 

D 

1903 

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n 

a 

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4 

T.  U.  Sisson 

D 

1909 

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n 

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5 

S.  A.  Witherspoon 

D 

1911 

a 

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6 

B,  P.  Harrison...  . 

D 

1911 

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n 

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7 

P.  E.  Quin 

D 
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1913 

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n 

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n 

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8 

J.  W.  Collier 

1909 

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n 

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Missouri 

1 

r.  T.  Lloyd 

D 

1897 

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2 

W.  W.  Rucker.... 

D 

1899 

n 

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J.  W.  Alexander.. 

D 

1907 

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D 

1907 

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W.  P.Borland.... 

D 

1909 

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C.  C.  Dickinson. . 

D 

1910 

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D 

1907 

n 

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D.  W.  Shackleford 

D 

1899 

n 

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Champ  Clark 

D 

1897 

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10 

R.  Bartholdt 

R 

1893 

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n 

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11 

W.  L.  Igoe 

D 

1913 

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L.  C.  Dyer 

R 

1911 

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13 

W.  L.  Hensley.... 

D 

1911 

a 

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n 

n 

n 

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n 

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14 

J.J.  Russell 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

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15 

P.  D.  Decker 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

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n 

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16 

T.  L.  Rubey 

D 

1911 

a 

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n 

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T.  Stout 

D 

1913 

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n-Negative  vote 
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sis.  R.  Barton 

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1903 

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1912 

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D 

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D 

1913 

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190.S 

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1899 

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D 

1913 

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10 

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D 

1913 

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0 

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11 

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D 

1906 

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1901 

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C.  A.  Talcott 

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1913 

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1913 

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1911 

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40 

R.  H.  Gittins 

D 

1913 

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1913 

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1899 

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J.  M.  Faison 

D 

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H.  L.  Godwin.... 

D 

1907 

n 

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D 

1903 

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D 

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10 

J.  M.  Gudger,  Jr.. 

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1913 

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present 
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1 

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2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

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D 

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1913 

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D 

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D 

1907 

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F.  B.  Willis 

R 

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I.  R.  Sherwood... 

D 

1907 

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10 

R.  M.  Switzer. . . . 

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1911 

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H.  C.  Claypool... 

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1911 

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12 

C.  Brumbaugh.  .  . 

D 

1913 

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J.  A.  Key 

D 

1913 

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D 

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G.  White 

D 

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16 

W.  B.  Francis.... 

D 

1911 

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0 

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17 

W.  A.  Ashbrook.. 

D 

1907 

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18 

J.  J.  Whitacre.... 

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1911 

a 

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19 

E.  R.  Bathrick. .  . 

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20 

W.  Gordon 

D 

1913 

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21 

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D 

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R 
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1907 

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1909 

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D 

1907 

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D 

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n 

a 

W.  H.  Murray.... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

155 


a-AfBrmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p- Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

t 

c 
c 

1 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

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3 
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D 

1913 

a 

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n 

a 

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a 

a 

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J.  B.  Thompson. . 

R 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

.... 

Oregon 

1 

W.  C.  Hawley.... 

R 

1907 

a 

n 

o 

a 

a 

^ 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

a 

2 

N.  J.  Sinnott 

R 

1913 

n 

a 



a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

3 

A.  W.  Lafferty.  . . 

P 

1911 

n 

a 

a 

* 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

o 

Pennsylvania 

1 

W.  S.  Vare 

R 

1912 

o 



o 

a 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

o 

2 

G.  S.  Graham.... 

R 

1913 

n 

. . . . 

o 

a 

a 

o 

o 

o 

o 

.... 

3 

J.  H.  Moore 

R 

1906 

a 

" 

o 

n 

o 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

a 

o 

n 

o 

4 

G.  W.  Edmonds.. 

R 

1913 

o 

o 

a 

o 

a 

a 

0 

o 

5 

M.  Donohoe 

D 

1911 

o 

o 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

.... 

6 

J.  W.  Logue 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

. .  .  . 

7 

T.  S.  Butler 

R 

1897 

a 

o 

o 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

o 

n 

n 

a 

8 

R.  E.  Difenderfer. 

D 
R 

1911 

o 

p 

o 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

o 

. . . 

9 

W.  W.  Griest 

1909 

a 

o 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

o 

10 

J.  R.  Farr 

P 

1911 



o 

a 

a 

o 

a 

a 

0 

a 

n 

n 

11 

J.J.Casey 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

a 

n 

o 

n 

n 

o 

1? 

R.  E.  Lee 

D 

1911 

a 

o 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

13 

J.  H.  Rothermeal. 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

^ 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

P 

o 

14 

W.  D.  B.  Ainey... 

R 

1911 

o 

o 

o 

o 

a 

o 

a 

^ 

a 

o 

IS 

E.  R.  Kiess 

R 

1913 

o 

o 

a 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

16 

J.  V.  Lesher 

D 

1913 



o 

n 

n 

o 

n 

- 

n 

a 

17 

F.  L.  Dershem,. .  . 

D 

1913 

o 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

o 

18 

A.  S.  Kreider 

R 

1913 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

1Q 

W.W.Bailey.... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

a 

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A.  R.  Brodbeck.... 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

o 

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C.  E.  Patton 

R 

1911 

n 

o 

o 

o 

a 

o 

a 

a 

o 

o 

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A.  L.  Keister 

R 

1913 

n 

n 

a 

a  ' 

a 

o 

n 

a 

156 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p-Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

fe 

^ 

8 
1 

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s 

a 
PQ 

'1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

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1 

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W.  N.  Carr 

D 

1913 

a 

.... 

a 

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n 

n 

o 

n 

o 

94 

H.  W.  Temple.... 

1913 

n 

__ 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

'>S 

M.  W.  Shreve.... 

R 

1913 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

Q 

26 

A.  M.  Palmer. .  . . 

D 
R 

1909 

n 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

o 

n 

a 

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27 

J.  N.  Langham. . . 

1909 

a 

n 

o 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

o 

a 

n 

O 

''R 

W.  J.  Hulings.... 

P 
R 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

70 

S.  G.  Porter 

1911 

nil 

o 

n 

o 

a 

o 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

o 

^n 

M.  C.  Kelly 

P 

1913 

a 

a 

a 

0 

a 

n 

o 

31 

J.  F.  Burke 

R 
R 

1905 

a 

o 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

0 

o 

o 

a 

p 

32 

A.J.  Barchfeld... 

1905 

a 

o 

o 

o 

^ 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

o 

A.  R.  Rupley 

P 

1913 

.... 

^ 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

u 

J.  M.  Morin 

R 

1913 



n 

■ 
•  •  •  • 

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a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

o 

A.  H.  Walters.... 

P 

1913 

.... 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

P.  E.  Lewis 

P 

1913 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

o 

Rhode  Island 

1 

G.  F.  O'Shaunessy 

D 

1911 

o 

n 

n 

° 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

o 

9 

P.  G.  Gerry 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

" 

o 

a 

n 

a 

o 

S 

A.  Kennedy 

R 

1913 

o 

o 

a 

a 

a 

o 

n 

South  Carolina 

1 

R.  S.  Whaley 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

o 

a 

o 

a 

a 

? 

J.  F.  Byrnes 

D 

1911 



a 

a 

n 

n 

" 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

3 

W.  Aiken 

D 

1903 

n 

a 

o 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

o 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

4 

J.  T.Johnson.... 

D 

1901 

n 

a 

o 

o 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

5 

D.  E.  Finley 

D 

1899 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

o 

o 

o 

n 

o 

a 

6 

J.  W.  Ragsdale... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

o 

a 

7 

A.  F.  Lever 

D 

1901 

n 

a 

o 

o 

o 

n 

n 

P 

P 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

South  Dakota 

R 

1 

C.  H.  Dillon 

1913 

.... 

n 

a 

a 

. . . . 

n 

n 

a 

n 

2 

C.  H.  Burke 

R 

1909 

a 

n 

n 

- 

o 

a 

^ 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

o 

o 

a 

157 


a-Afiirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p- Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

1 

Q 

1 

& 

L 

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1 

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1 

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< 

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II 

o 

11 

id 

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HO 

11 

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1 

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II 

i 

ll 

13 

s 

.52 

Q 

3 

E.  W.  Martin. .  . . 

R 

1908 

a 

a 

o 

n 

p 

o 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

Tennessee 

1 

S.  R.  Sells 

R 

1911 

o 

o 

o 

a 

a 

o 

n 

a 

n 

2 

R.  W.  Austin 

R 

1909 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

3 

J.  A.  Moon 

D 

1897 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

a 

o 

o 

o 

n 

a 

n 

a 

o 

4 

C.  Hull 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

" 

n 

a 

5 

W.  C.  Houston... 

D 

1905 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

n 

^ 

a 

a 

a 

o 

o 

n 

a 

a 

6 

J.  W.  Byrns 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

7 

L.  P.  Padgett.... 

D 

1901 

n 

a 

° 

o 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

8 

T.W.Sims 

D 

1897 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

o 

9 

P.J.  Garrett 

D 

1905 

n 

a 

n 

" 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

10 

K.  D.  McKellar. . 

D 

1911 

a 

o 

o 

n 

n 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a, 

Texas 

4 

H.  W.  Vaughan... 

D 

1913 



a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

? 

M.  Dies. .  . 

D 

1909 

n 

a 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

3 

J.Young 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

o 

4 

S.  Rayburn 

D 

1913 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

5 

J.  Beall 

D 

1903 

n 

a 

o 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

a 

6 

R.Hardy 

D 

1907 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

7 

A.  W.  Gregg 

D 

1903 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

o 

n 

a 

n 

n 

a 

8 

J.H.Eagle 

D 

1913 

o 

a 

.... 

n 

n 

n 

o 

a 

9 

G.  F.  Burgess 

D 

1901 

n 

a 

o 

n 

o 

n 

n 

o 

o 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

10 

J.  P.  Buchanan... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

.... 

n 

- 

a 

n 

a 

11 

R.  L.  Henry 

D 

1897 

n 

o 

a 

a 

- 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

o 

a 

1? 

0.  Callaway 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

o 

. . . . 

13 

J.  H.  Stephens.... 

D 

1897 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

o 

a 

14 

J.  L.  Slayden 

D 

1897 

n 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

o 

15 

J.  N.  Garner 

D 

1903 

n 

a 

a 

P 

a 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

16 

W.  R.  Smith 

D 

1903 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

° 

158 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p- Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

1 

1 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

1 

1 

a 
1 

(0 

I 

h 

.y 

U3 

f 
1 

6 

3 

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o 

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li 

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11 
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Ha 

1 

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1 

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M 

ll 

og 

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H.  W.  Sumners... 

D 

1913 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

D.  E.  Garrett..  .. 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

n 

n 

a 

Utah 

J.  Howell 

R 

1903 

a 

o 

o 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

o 

a 

a 

a 

J.  Johnson 

R 

1913 

n 

n 



a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

Vermont 

. 

F.  L.  Greene 

R 

1912 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

2 

F.  Plumley 

R 

1909 

a 

n 

o 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

n 

o 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

Virginia 

1 

W.A.Jones 

D 

1891 

n 

a 

a 

o 

o 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

o 

a 

o 

? 

E.  E.  Holland.... 

D 

1911 

a 

n 

n 

o 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

?, 

A..  J.  Montague.. . 

D 

1913 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

o 

a 

o 

4 

W.  A.  Watson.... 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

o 

a 

o 

a 

o 

5 

E.  W.  Saunders.. 

D 

1906 

n 

o 

o 

n 

o 

n 

n 

o 

o 

a 

o 

a 

n 

a 

o 

6 

Z.  Glass 

D 
D 

1902 

n 

o 

o 

o 

o 

n 

n 

o 

o 

a 

n 

P 

n 

a 

a 

7 

r.  Hay 

1897 

n 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

o 

a 

a 

8 

C.  C.  Carlin 

D 

1907 

n 

P 

a 

o 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

o 

o 

a 

o 

9 

C.  B.  Slemp 

R 

1907 

a 

o 

n 

o 

o 

a 

a 

o 

o 

n 

o 

o 

o 

n 

o 

10 

H.  D.  Flood 

D 

1901 

n 

- 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

^ 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

a 

Washington 

^ 

1 

W.  E.  Humphrey . 

1903 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

?, 

A.  Johnson 

R 

1913 

n 



o 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

3 

W.  L.  LaFollette.. 

R 

1911 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

J.  A.  Falconer 

P 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

J.  W.  Bryan 

P 

1913 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

o 

West  Virginia 

1 

M.  M.  Neely 

D 

1913 

n 

n 

n 

n 

2 

W.  G.Brown,  Jr.. 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

a 

o 

a 

n 

o 

n 

n 

n 

3 

S.  B.  Avis 

R 

1913 

o 

n 

a 

a 

n 

o 

n 

a 

159 


a-Affirmative  vote 
n-Negative  vote 
p- Answered 

present 
o-Not  voting 

1 

1 

' 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

i 

•3 
1 

1 

is 

B 
< 

3 

1 

5 

11 

CO 

li 

o 

CO  i 

MO 

cc 
HO 

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So 

M 

nj  CIS 

o  ca 
f-^O 

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II 

h 

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11 
II 

1 

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O  59 

HQ 

4 

H.  H.  Moss.  Jr. . . 

R 

1913 

n 

o 

a 

o 

a 

" 

n 



5 

J.A.Hughes 

R 

1901 

a 

o 

n 

o 

o 

P 

a 

n 

n 

P 

o 

o 

O 

o 

P 

H.  Sutherland.... 

R 

1913 

.  . .  . 

n 

o 

a 

a 

^ 

a 

n 

Wisconsin 

1 

H.  A.  Cooper 

R 

1893 

n 

n 

a 

o 

a 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

n 

n 

a 

n 

o 

2 

M.E.Burke 

D 

1911 

a 

- 

a 

n 

n 

o 

a 

n 

o 

n 

3 

J.  M.  Nelson 

R 

1906 

n 

o 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

a 

a 

o 

n 

a 

n 

n 

4 

W.J.  Gary 

R 

1907 

n 

n 

P 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

a 

o 

a 

o 

o 

P 

n 

5 

W.  H.  Stafford... 

R 

1913 

n 



a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

n 

6 

M.  K.  Reilly 

D 

1913 

a 

a 

n 

o 

a 

n 

n 

a 

7 

J.  J.  Esch 

R 

1899 

a 

n 

P 

o 

n 

n 

o 

o 

o 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

8 

E.  E.  Browne.... 

R 

1913 

n 

o 

n 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

9 

T.  F.  Konop 

D 

1911 

a 

a 

o 

n 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

o 

10 

J.  A.  Frear 

R 

1913 

n 



a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

n 

a 

11 

I.  L.  Lenroot 

R 

1909 

n 

n 

a 

o 

n 

n 

n 

a 

a 

a 

a 

n 

a 

o 

a 

Wyoming 

F.  W.  Mondell. . . 

R 

1899 

a 

n 

o 

o 

n 

a 

a 

n 

n 

n 

o 

a 

o 

n 

a 

160 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

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